By Gordon Bonin Of the NEWS Staff

Last Thursday, the day after a federal appeals court ruled that Elian Gonzalez must remain in the United States until his asylum hearing, tens of thousands of Cubans turned out for a rally in front of the United States Interests Section building here calling for the boy’s return.
Into the midst of the massed demonstrators waded a group of more than a dozen American educators, some holding aloft signs that expressed their support for Elian’s return to Cuba.

The Cubans greeted them with cheers and handshakes. This moved some of the Americans to tears. They were part of a group of 38 U.S. educators, the majority from Maine, on the island last week to see its school system.
Paula Collier, who teaches language arts at Bath Middle School, walked into the crowd carrying a sign that read ‘‘Americans for the Return of Elian.’’

Collier said that she was ‘‘a little bit afraid’’ of the crowd’s possible reaction. But ‘‘I met nothing but warmth,’’ she said. ‘‘They’d read the sign, look me in the eye and give me a thumbs up or nod their heads or say, ‘Wonderful.’ It was very moving.’’

‘‘The Cubans smiled and cheered and came over to talk to us and read our signs,’’ said Alison Whitney, a school nurse at Oxford Hills Middle School. ‘‘They reacted positively to us.’’
Some Cubans approached the educators and told them they understood that a majority of Americans supported Elian’s return, but they still were thrilled to see an actual demonstration of that sentiment, said Barbara West of Bath.
She was moved by a father and his son, who was roughly the same age as Elian.

The father listened intently to the speakers, West said, and then ‘‘he came over to us and gave us a poster from a previous rally that celebrated the 40th anniversary of the Cuban revolution.’’
One Cuban man interviewed in the crowd said, ‘‘Cubans have nothing against the United States. The people of the United States are not to blame, but the U.S. government is [to blame] for the situation with Elian.

‘‘The U.S. government is feeble,’’ he said. ‘‘Over there [in Florida] the law doesn’t function. The Cuban-American Mafia is stronger than the government.’’ Another man said that the United States sends illegal immigrant children from Mexico and Haiti back to their homelands, but was ‘‘too weak’’ to take Elian from his relatives in Miami and return him to Cuba.

Their comments came less than 36 hours before federal agents plucked 6-year-old Elian out of the home of his great-uncle and cousin in Miami and delivered him to his father outside Washington, D.C.

The more than three-hour rally in Havana was part political theater, part festival, with musical groups interspersed among the speakers. It was held along the Malecon — the sea wall and boulevard that separate western Havana from the surf of the Straits of Florida. The speakers’ platform was set beneath metal scaffolding arches erected in anticipation of Elian’s return to Cuba.

The Cuban press reported that ‘‘More than 100,000 patriots ... gathered ... in front of the Office of United States Interests to denounce the imperialist American government’s tolerance of the prolonged kidnapping of Elian.’’
Schoolchildren and workers are bused in for these events. Rows of yellow and black school buses lined the Malecon, along with city buses, and company buses and trucks used to transport people.

While the rally didn’t begin until 5 p.m., three hours earlier, ‘‘you could sense energy on the streets as people were getting ready, piling into buses and heading off,’’ said Marci Train, who teaches on Long Island in Casco Bay.

Walking along the Malecon toward the heart of the rally, one had the feeling of the aftermath of a county fair, said Carolyn Bennett, who teaches on North Haven. There were people sitting on the sea wall talking. Some played in the roadway, which was blocked off to all traffic except for vehicles carrying participants to the rally. People strolled along the boulevard. Groups of students headed back to their buses dancing and singing, beating rhythm on drums and sticks or clapping.

Hawkers sold roasted peanuts. Vendors with pedal carts marketed ham sandwiches, drinks or ice cream. Most of the crowd was students, noticeable because of their school uniforms. Having heard that students’ grades can be lowered if they don’t attend the protests, Paula Collier said, ‘‘There was more emotion at the rally than I thought there’d be.’’

‘‘Obviously all the kids trucked in were having a fine time,’’ said Alison Whitney. ‘‘But up by the speakers platform there was a large core of students ready to cheer and wave their flags at the right time and words.’’

This core wore Elian T-shirts, green trousers and black boots, marking them as students of a high school run along military lines. The speakers denounced the United States and praised Cuban defiance of ‘‘el imperialismo yanki.’’

Hassan Perez, president of the Cuban university students’ federation, said that ‘‘not three, not three thousand, nor three million judges are going to thwart Elian’s return ... to his native homeland ... to be with his father.’’

The rallies are not entirely spontaneous. Cuban television airs announcements for upcoming demonstrations. They tell when, where, and why a ‘‘Marcha del Pueblo Combatiente’’ is going to take place.

The Elian protest was the second in Havana last week. Two days earlier, tens of thousands marched in front of the Czech embassy protesting the Czech Republic’s sponsorship of a resolution at a United Nations human rights meeting in Geneva that condemned Cuba’s human rights record.

The American educators made German television, which was covering the Elian event, as well as Cuba’s national newspaper, Granma.
The paper ran a picture of Paula Collier and her sign. The article mentioned the Maine educators saying, ‘‘At the height of the denunciations, a sign carried by a group of North Americans amidst a sea of Cuban flags was waved vigorously: Americans for the Return of Elian.’’

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