Castro Wines And Dines After Poverty Summit

Fidel Castro, slightly buzzed from vintage chardonnay, emerged from a cellar Thursday with the bright colors of a winemaker’s knighthood on his olive green tunic.

“I like it here,” Castro said, after a madcap ride through the backroads of Burgundy, the last fling of a European trip that effectively took Cuba out of its diplomatic isolation.

“I don’t know what my visit to Europe did for Cuba,” an ebullient Castro told The Associated Press before leaving, “but it did a lot for me. My strongest impression? Chablis wine.”

He came to visit Gerard Bourgoin, a French poultry mogul who went to Cuba in 1992 to sell chickens and befriended Castro by serving him chilled Chablis along with ham he had brought from home.

After addressing the poverty summit in Copenhagen, lunching with French President Francois Mitterrand and speaking to UNESCO in Paris, Castro came to see how Bourgoin slaughtered chickens.

Then, in a motorcade of flashing lights and discreetly hidden firearms, Castro was taken 30 miles across rolling farmland, through old stone villages, to the vineyards of Chablis.

Standing among vines still bare from winter, Castro peppered his hosts with questions about planting, yield and technique. “Cuba is too hot for grapes,” he observed, with some disappointment.

He stopped at J. Moreau & Sons, which turns out six million bottles of white Burgundies each year, for some serious tasting.

Then he was inducted into the Confrerie des Piliers Chablaisien, draped with a sash in yellow, green, blue and red and a silver wine taster’s cup.

“We’re very happy to see him here,” said Julie Campos, marketing director at J. Moreau. “He has done much for his people. There must be evolution after revolution, and we should help.”

The visit caused surprisingly little stir in the Yonne River backcountry, near Auxerre, 120 miles southeast of Paris.

A few farmers stood open-mouthed by their tractors as the Cuban leader flashed by in a dark blue Renault. Villagers clutching baguettes stepped backward as cars careered around corners.

At Chailley, Bourgoin’s headquarters, Bernard Durif ignored the tumult, peering into the engine of a Citroen at his repair garage. “No big deal,” he said, shrugging. “Something to tie up traffic.”

Still, a small curious crowd gathered in the cold outside Bourgoin’s house at St. Florentin, waiting for the end of a four-hour lunch.

Castro, clearly enjoying himself, talked mostly about wine and chickens.

But Ricardo Alarcon, his right-hand man, said in an interview that he felt the weeklong visit to Denmark and France showed the world that Cuba was ready for open dealings with the West.

“Our relations with France are excellent,” he said. “We deal regularly with the European Union, Canada, others. The problem is that it costs us more, and we are short of resources.”

Alarcon, president of the Cuban National Assembly, threw up his hands when asked how long he thought the U.S. embargo would last.

“It makes no sense for the Americans,” he said. “Either it is successful, and there is an explosion in Cuba, which is not in their interest. Or it fails, which is not in their interest.”

The more that European officials and investors ignore American entreaties to isolate Cuba, he said, the more Washington loses influence among its allies.

Corinne Bourgoin, president of her father’s poultry empire, said her business was expanding quickly in Cuba. Already, Bourgoin sells about $10 million a year in chickens.

If the U.S. embargo continues, she said, European and Canadian suppliers will solidify long-term footholds in a developing market.

After lunch, Castro stopped to chat about his visit. Except for two earlier trips to Spain, it was his first West European venture since taking power 36 years ago.

Asked if he wanted to travel to the United States, he laughed.

“It is so close to us, why not?” he said. “Maybe I’ll go on a raft.”