You didn’t need any kind of poltical reason to go. Lots and lots of Americans went to Russia and other Eastern Bloc countries during the cold war just as tourists. I myself went to Hungary when it was still Communist, just to sightsee, and to experience some of my family heritage. I don’t think the U.S. Government gave any thought about my travels.
Yes, but the US had not passed an embargo against Hungary, and had not made it a federal offence for US citizens to spend money in Hungary, or receive any goods from anyone in Hungary, which it has done with respect to Hungary.
Sorry, that last line should have read “as it has done with Cuba.”
They are also hideously expensive. The ones I’ve seen charge something like $5 - 6k for a one- to two-week trip. I’ve been toying with the idea of developing my own itinerary, patterned on the authorized people-to-people trips, to see whether I could get an individual license for it. If I wanted to lie on the beach for a week, there are plenty of places I could go, but if I go to Cuba I’m not paying that kind of money - I can’t afford it.
I’m thinking the Canadian passport will be the one with the stamp in it.
Does that exempt him from US law, if he is an American?
But that doesn’t make it legal. Canadian passport or not, you’re still a US citizen under US law.
Whenever I’ve gone to Cuba they haven’t really stamped my passport (I’m a U.S. citizen). They give me the tourist visa on a separate piece of paper, and then one time stamped a little red silhouette of a house about 2 centimeters square, with the word “BANK” on it. That’s all it said. Then, after I paid the tourist tax before the flight out, they stamped it again with the same image, except in black ink. Another time it was an image of an airplane, with no words at all. Most recently they just stamp the tourist card. But never have they stamped the word “Cuba” in my passport. (This was about nine years ago.)
It didn’t really matter, because I fly to and from Tijuana, and then walk across the border into the U.S., where they don’t really bother to look at the stamp pages of the passport.
However, when you arrive in Cuba, be prepared to tell them exactly where you are staying. I think they want you to say the name of an “official” tourist hotel, not the name of a casa particular, so that’s what I say. I don’t think they actually check on it, though.
It was only money earned in the US that was illegal to spend. If your money was from Canadian sources no problem.
Now I will give you a reason not to go. I have friends who used to go every year. But they were getting harassed repeatedly by heavy handed cops. Their offense was giving gifts to locals. For example, they would get hamburgers for lunch, but leave one in their room for the cleaning lady who could not ordinarily get hamburgers. The cops caught on and questioned them about it. They took ice cream (they said Cuban ice cream is the best they had ever eaten) down to the medical dispensary. At one point, they noticed a cop questioning every car coming into the parking lot. They had the temerity to ask the cop what he was doing and he explained that some locals were illegally renting their car to tourists and he was making sure that the driver was the owner. And one of two said they questioned her for over an hour on account of the prescription drugs she was bringing–in this case for her own use. They got a doctor to come in and he repeatedly held up a bottle and asked her what it was and what it was for. Over and over for more than an hour. They let her go, but they gone never back. She is about 75 and not in good health.
:: bump ::
Looks like I’m getting my wish, and then some.. I can’t imagine how one would even try to enforce restrictions on what Americans do in Cuba. I guess nobody will bother. Woohoo!