By JUAN O. TAMAYO
             Herald Staff Writer

             Cuba evacuated 200,000 people Wednesday as a re-strengthened Hurricane
             Georges punched into the eastern end of the island and belted already tattered
             homes and electricity and telephone grids with 80-mph winds.

             President Fidel Castro took personal control of the crisis, going on television to talk
             about possible storm paths and preparations -- and to hint that Cuba won't accept
             relief aid from exiles or Washington.

             Civil defense officials in the eastern towns of Guantanamo and Baracoa were
             reported on full alert as they waited for Georges to make landfall Wednesday
             evening after mowing a path of death and devastation through Haiti, the Dominican
             Republic, Puerto Rico and several smaller Caribbean islands.

             ``We have to take exceptional measures because this is not a hurricane. This is a
             monster, Juan Carlos Robinson, head of the Communist Party in the neighboring
             province of Santiago, told Havana Radio.

             The mountainous eastern end of Cuba has been suffering through its worst drought
             in 40 years, but the kind of rain that Georges packed was certain to cause heavy
             damages to its coffee, sugar and fruit crops.

             Officials declared a state of ``hurricane emergency in Cuba's five easternmost
             provinces, put the central part of the island on ``alert and late Wednesday, put
             Havana and western Pinar del Rio provinces on ``stand-by.

             The 200,000 people evacuated included thousands of high school students attending
             rural schools or volunteering for the coffee harvest, plus families living in flood-prone
             or coastal areas or in precarious housing.

             ``The rain and the winds are not too bad right now . . . but the sea is really rough,
             said Jose Enrique Gomez of Baracoa, a coastal town 690 miles east of Havana.

             Construction crews shored up 28 dilapidated homes in Baracoa to keep them from
             collapsing with the rains, Gomez said, and all foreign tourists were moved into the
             Porto Santo Hotel. ``The tourists are well guarded, he added.

             Other tourists in the northeastern beach resort of Guardalavaca, favored by
             Europeans, were driven 35 miles to the town of Holguin aboard buses, rented cars
             and even trucks, said one Holguin resident.

             Employees in the hotels where the tourists were being sheltered have been warning
             the guests that they will not be allowed to take photographs of any damage once the
             storm is over, the French AFP news agency reported.

             All flights from Havana to the eastern provinces were canceled, schools were
             closed early and officials were calling on truck and bus drivers to be ready to
             evacuate more people as Georges' path over the next day becomes clear.

             Officials in the province of Holguin reported they had readied 224 possible
             evacuation shelters and put more than 200 hospitals and clinics on alert to receive
             any injured.

             ``They are treating this as a full blown emergency . . . and doing their usual good job
             on civil defense, said one Western journalist in Havana. ``That's one of the good
             sides of a government that controls everything.

             Castro spent two hours Wednesday at the Cuban Meteorological Institute, a visit
             that was televised to the nation. He said he had sent his brother Raul, the defense
             minister, and several top Communist Party officials to eastern Cuba to coordinate
             relief efforts after the storm passes.

             ``We know what to do in any situations . . . and I have even given instructions to do
             nothing too hastily, because we have time and we've foreseen all possibilities, Castro
             said.

             Castro showed Georges' predicted path on a map, provided ultra-detailed reports of
             civil defense preparations for the storm and recalled past hurricanes and damages.

             ``What has allowed us to overcome past catastrophes is our revolutionary unity,
             Castro said, wearing his traditional olive green fatigues. ``This is almost a war.

             With obvious pique, Castro also declared that should Cuba need relief aid from
             abroad in the wake of the hurricane, ``we cannot accept aid from those who
             blockade us, -- Cuba's term for the U.S. trade embargo.

             And he noted that after Hurricane Lili swept over central Cuba in 1996, some of the
             foreign aid had arrived ``with little signs -- apparently a reference to the notes
             slipped into some donations from Miami exiles. Some of the slips said simply ``From
             exiles, or ``Exiles love you.
 

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