I can't say if these guys are incredibly brave or if this is an insouciant flirtation with danger usually associated with the young and naive. Whether it's courage or youthful bravado, they were certainly lucky to leave Cuba alive with all limbs intact.
(I must say if these were any of my sons, I'd probably box their ears and pull their passports).
That being said, we're lucky to have this exposé! This is not the Cuba of luxury presented to pre-approved tourists who can't easily stray from their plush vacation areas closed to Cuban nationals except high level Communist Party apparatchiks and workers. Itineraries must be scrutinized and rubber-stamped in advance and minders (including electronic) are omnipresent.
Janet Levy,
Los Angeles
P.S. In 2007, I traveled to GITMO for the 3-4 day journalist's tour. At one point, tour participants visited the outskirts of the base to see the Cuban border station. Was I ever glad we were accompanied by armed U.S. soldiers! One yelled at me for pointing toward the Cuban station claiming that the Communist authorities threatened to shoot people who did so.
Also, years later, I had the privilege of interviewing Jose Basulto, the leader of Brothers to the Rescue (BTTR), a humanitarian search-and-rescue mission made up of Cuban expats that saved over 4,000 lives assisting Cuban emigrant rafters fleeing from the Communist "paradise." BTTR operated from 1991 to 1996, when two of their rescue planes were shot down by the Cuban Air Force.
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