As rules relax, exiles take DVDs and more to Cuba

By Angus MacSwan

MIAMI (Reuters) - The early morning charter flight from Miami to Havana looks like a traveling emporium as Cuban exiles carry back items ranging from DVD players to bicycles for friends and relatives in their deprived homeland.

In the check-in line at Miami International Airport on Friday, three days after long-time leader Fidel Castro said he would retire as president, baggage carts were piled high with bags stuffed with clothes, boxes of electronics, coffee machines and car parts.

The abundance of goods -- the result of a small change in Cuban customs regulations brought last year by Castro's younger brother and expected successor, Raul Castro -- could be a sign of things to come.

"To get by in Cuba you need to have family here," said a man named Hernandez, 28, a health-care worker who was visiting Cuba for the first time since he left 19 years ago.

"It's mostly clothes, medicines, all kinds of stuff you can't find there," said Hernandez, who declined to give his full name. "Underwear. People have no underwear over there."

He also was taking a wheelchair for his grandmother.

The scene illustrated the shortages of consumer goods and the difficulties of day-to-day life in the communist-run country. It also was a sign of possible change as Fidel Castro, who has ruled Cuba through strict central planning since 1959, steps down and Raul Castro takes over.

Raul became interim president when Fidel Castro fell ill in July 2006 and is expected to be named president on Sunday. Many analysts believe he could bring on moderate reforms to improve living conditions and a struggling economy.

One measure he introduced in June was to ease tight restrictions on what goods Cuban expatriates could bring when they visit.

The result has been a virtual caravan of items being taken on the charter flights that leave Miami every day on the 90-mile (145-km) journey across the Florida Straits to Havana.

The flights, operated by a company named Gulfstream International, are run as special charters because of the U.S. economic embargo on Cuba and require U.S. government approval.

U.S. RESTRICTIONS

Washington bans most U.S. citizens from traveling to Cuba and Cuban Americans are limited to one visit every three years.

On Friday, operators at the airport wrapping travelers' suitcases in protective shrink-wrap were doing brisk business. One woman had a brand new Fender Stratocaster electric guitar for a friend who plays in a band.

Jorge Miro, 37, an air conditioning repairman who left Cuba three years ago, was bringing a bicycle for his father.