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 'That's my team' Cubans may leave but they still cheer for their team
Posted: Sunday March 28, 1999 06:17 PM
MIAMI (AP) -- Alberto Esquivel may have chosen to leave Cuba to live in the United States, but his allegiance to the Cuban national baseball team remains strong. "That's my team," said Esquivel, who moved to Miami five months ago on a visa and a hope for a better quality of life. "That's my country, above all else." Esquivel, 18, could only sneak a peak of his home team playing the Baltimore Orioles Sunday in Havana. He waited tables at Latin American Restaurant, a Cuban eatery where customers demanded to see the game on every television in the place. Even though many said they wouldn't watch, Cuban exiles living here couldn't help but tune their sets to see the Orioles beat their former home team 3-2 in 11 innings. For most exiles, the sight of Americans and Cubans taking the field together on the communist island was a sign of disrespect for those who have fought for democracy on the island -- a fight, they say, many continue to pay with their lives. "I think this stinks," said Berta Ruiz, lunching on a plate of beef and black beans and rice as she watched the game at the restaurant. "I feel sad for all the dead Cubans who risked their lives trying to fight communism and for those who died trying to make it here to live in a democracy." The Orioles trip to Cuba is the first in 40 years for a professional American team. Most Cuban exiles in South Florida objected to the game. Weeks before the game, hundreds protested outside the Orioles spring training facility in nearby Fort Lauderdale, hoping to convince the team to cancel its plans. But unlike Ruiz and many exiles in Miami, some Cubans supported the trip. They said seeing the two teams on the field, each waving their own flag and singing their own anthem, was an emotional triumph for exiles. "I think this is a great sign. I believe in an exchange between the two countries," said Bernardo Benes, who worked as an attorney for the Cuban Sugar Kings, a pro baseball team in Havana in the mid-1950's. "The more communication we have with people on the island the more chances we have that it opens up [to democracy]." Benes, 64, was hired in 1954 to work for the Sugar Kings. At the time dozens of professional teams played on the same field where the Cuban national team faced the Orioles. Back then it was called Estadio Tropical -- Tropical Stadium. The Blanco-Herrera family, which produced La Tropical beer, built it. Today the family lives in South Florida, along with thousands of other Cubans in exile. "We had a box there," said Chono Blanco-Herrera, whose husband Cosme ran the beer company. "We saw lots of games. We loved it." Mrs. Blanco-Herrera, who left the island in 1959 when Castro took over the island and the company, refused to watch the game. At Maximo Gomez Park on Eighth Street in the heart of Miami's Little Havana neighborhood, the game of dominoes dominated table conversation. But for a moment, the players -- mostly Cuban -- offered their take on the game. "It's a farce," said Antonio Llopiz. "Castro wants to change the world. He won't let the world change Cuba."
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