Dispatches from Cuba: Securing a visa

Physics Today‘s Toni Feder is traveling to Cuba to learn about the country’s physics community and how it has been affected by the recent thaw in US–Cuba relations. She’ll be blogging about her experiences through mid-December.

Sunday, 4 December 2016

My trip to Cuba started with my contacting physicists there in the hope of reporting about Cuba from the US. Then my editor suggested I go in person. How exciting! President Obama and Cuban president Raúl Castro announced normalization of diplomatic relations between their two countries in December 2014. But normalization is a process, not a switch.

The first complication arose when I tried to book a flight. I discovered that because I am traveling to Cuba as a science journalist, I had to get my visa from the Cuban embassy in Washington, DC; more than a dozen other categories of visa can be arranged through travel agents.

I called the embassy several times. It went something like this: “You have reached the Embassy of Cuba. For Spanish, press 1. For English, press 3.” After selecting the appropriate branch of the embassy, I was told: “You are number six in line. Please stay on the line…. You are number five in line. Please stay on the line….” and so on, until I heard a click and the following: “Please leave a message and we will get back to you.” No one got back to me. Eventually, I decided to fly to Washington to go to the embassy in person.

On a Tuesday morning in October, I went to the Cuban embassy on 16th Street Northwest. It is a large, stately building not so different from the dozens of other embassies in Washington. Reopened in July 2015, it is surrounded by a tall, locked fence. No one waited out front. Meanwhile, across the street, people were thronging in front of a shabby set of buildings, also protected by a fence, that make up the Cuban consulate.

As we waited for the consulate to open, people chatted, mostly in Spanish. They gave each other advice about the store around the corner where you could get the required money order, and discussed where you could get and how much you should pay for the two required passport-sized photos. A couple of very casually dressed men came out to the gate and made announcements in Spanish. It was hard to hear, which precipitated some chaos as everyone jostled for position and tried to figure out which documents they should have on hand. People were sent in a few at a time. Eventually I figured out that I was in the wrong place. Instead of the consulate, I was supposed to go across the street to the imposing embassy and ask for a particular administrator.

At the embassy entrance, I rang the bell and waited. Nothing happened. Eventually, a receptionist came out and spoke to me through the fence. She had a business card in her hand and said I needed to have an appointment with the official in question. He wasn’t in right then, she said, but I could call him.

I left and tried to figure out how to get an appointment. I had a feeling that I wouldn’t have much luck reaching him, which turned out to be right. So I contacted a writer at Nature who I knew had been to Cuba a few months earlier. She gave me contact information for someone at the embassy who had helped her (thank you, Sara!). I got through immediately and was able to make an appointment for the next morning.

When I rang the bell, the receptionist from the day before descended the stairs, again holding a business card. When she heard I had an appointment, she went back inside. A couple of minutes later, the gate clicked open and I went in. I had a quick, pleasant, and easy meeting with my embassy contact. I really was going to get a visa!

Then the wait began. More than a month later, I received an email saying my visa had been approved and would be mailed to me. I would leave in about two weeks.

And now I am on the way, having scrambled to book flights, find a place to stay, and make sure I had everything I would need for the trip.

I’m excited about talking to physicists and students in Cuba and to experience and learn about the culture. I am hoping to get a sense of how the physics community functions, what its scientific strengths and weaknesses are, what it needs, and how the thawing of relations with the US may affect the Cuban research enterprise.