Journey to Freedom

How far is 94 miles? That depends. Millions of people travel that distance or more every day by car, bus, or train without thinking twice about it. In just a couple of hours, you arrive at your destination and get on with your day.

But what if you were at sea in a small boat in the dark of night? So many people are crammed aboard that you can’t sit, and cold water leaks in, soaking your feet. Tossed on rough waters for hours, you fear you won’t live to see the dawn. But at last, you reach your destination—and a chance to build a new life.

In 1980, more than 100,000 people made that journey to flee Cuba and seek freedom in the United States. At the time, a dictator named Fidel Castro ruled Cuba. For 20 years, his Communist government had controlled all land and businesses. Constant shortages of food and other goods led to high prices, making it hard for most Cubans to make ends meet. Anyone who spoke out against Castro could be jailed or even killed.

Many Cubans wanted a way out, but leaving the island nation wasn’t easy. Then on April 1, 1980, a man took a dramatic stab at freedom: He stole a bus and rammed it through the fence of Peru’s embassy in Havana, Cuba’s capital.

An embassy’s grounds are considered the soil of that embassy’s nation, so once inside the fence, the bus was technically in Peru. The South American nation granted the driver and the people with him asylum—official protection given to someone fleeing from danger.

That inspired others. Within days, 10,000 Cubans flocked to the embassy’s grounds, also requesting asylum. Several nations besides Peru—including the U.S.—offered to take in asylum seekers.

On April 20, Castro announced that Cubans who wanted to go to the U.S. could leave by boat from the port city of Mariel. U.S. President Jimmy Carter agreed to accept them. Over the next six months, 125,000 Cubans sailed to Florida in what became known as the Mariel boatlift. Not everyone made it: Some boats sank or were capsized, and at least 27 people drowned.

What was it like to flee from Cuba? For one person’s story, turn the page.

—Kathy Wilmore

Why did your family want to leave Cuba?
Because in Cuba there was no freedom. If you said anything bad about the government, you went to jail. People made only $50 a month, and with that they couldn’t even buy food, and they could never leave the country, not even on vacation.

What was the process of getting on the boat?
Once we left our neighborhood, we had to go to a refugee camp and wait there until we could leave. That’s because so many people were trying to leave the island, we had to wait our turn. We spent 40 days sleeping in tents and standing in long lines to get food to eat. There was no entertainment. There was no school or parks or toys to play with.

What did it feel like to leave Cuba?
I didn’t feel anything, because I didn’t understand what was going on. I didn’t know then that I would never see my grandparents, cousins, or friends ever again. All I remember is that when we left our home, our dog ran after our taxi for miles, and I felt bad for him.

What happened next?
We went to live with my father’s sister in a three-bedroom house in Miami. There were 10 of us living in that house! It was very crowded, and we didn’t get along. We lived there around three months, then went to live with my mother’s sister. My parents, my brother, and I shared a bedroom. Three months later, we left because my mother didn’t get along with her stepmother, who also lived in that house. We moved to our own place. But my brother and I were alone there most of the time, including weekends, because our parents were always working.

Before you got here, what did you think the U.S. would be like?
I thought the U.S. would be like Disney World: All your dreams come true. For us kids, life in the U.S. was tougher than our life in Cuba, because we had no relatives nearby so we were bored. We had to come home from school and let ourselves into the house, then be alone until 9 or 10 p.m., when our parents got home from work. In Cuba, we played all day outside with all our friends. But in the U.S., we had no friends.

How different was the U.S. from Cuba?
Very! In Cuba, you would get rations—a limited amount of food the government gave you. Each month we’d get three cups of rice and beans per person, one gallon of milk per child, and one box of cereal. In the U.S., we had everything we wanted to eat.

In Cuba, you’d get maybe five shirts and five pairs of pants for the whole year. In the U.S., we could get anything we could afford from the store.

When we got here, we were poor, so we couldn’t afford a lot. We got our clothes from a second-hand store, and we ate the same food every night. But it was still much, much better here because of all the opportunities. Now I enjoy a much better life than if I had stayed in Cuba.

Are you glad you came to the U.S.?
One hundred percent yes. This is my country now, and I am proud to be an American.

^{This is an edited, condensed version of Benjamin’s interview.}