First of all, I want to thank all of you who took the time to tell me your answers and some of you who wrote your stories. As I read through each comment, I realized that this was a perfect snapshot of our Cuban community.
With the naming of each city and date, I read pain and sadness and nostalgia. Thank you so much for sharing this part of your life. Your answers made me stop and think.
Every single Cuban here in the U.S. and actually scattered across the world, has a story like this.
They all begin with the same way. "My family left Cuba in……"
It's almost like our history began the day we left our homeland. And that's what we all have in common, isn't it?
I wish I could give everyone a book, (I'm generous like that, but that's not important right now) but I had to choose just one name.
So, I went to Random.org and used the True Random Number Generator. There were 3 people who entered their names twice, so I subtracted those. From 47 comments I entered the number 44. The winner was Comment #2. (See screenshot below)
Where: Mami from Sagua la Grande; Papi from Guantanamo
When Arrived USA: July 1, 1964
Still Have Family? Yes, tios y primos
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Congratulations, Ileana! You're going to love this book.
Please shoot me an email with MARTA, I WON STUFF ON YOUR BLOG in the subject line, so I don't accidentally delete it.
Thank you all, again, for entering this contest. To the rest of you, I encourage you to get this book, Historic Photos of Cuban Miami by Jennifer Ortiz. It's such a great history of the struggles and triumphs of Cubans as we began our lives here in the U.S., specifically in Miami.
Today, more than ever, I feel privileged to be a part of such a rich community.
Ileana said…