Month: February 2017

I remember looking out the window as the plane took off from Havana.

It was Aug. 9, 1960. I was 15 years old and leaving my country with my mother and brother to reunite with my father in Miami. He had left months earlier to find schools and a place to live. We didn’t realize it would be for good.

My dad, an attorney with a passion for travel, got a job in sales with Guest Airways and an apartment at 23 Phoenetia Ave., Coral Gables. He enrolled my brother and me at Merrick Elementary and Coral Gables Senior High, respectively.

Two other families we knew from Havana lived in the same eight-unit building, and we would gather in the small patio in the early evenings. But Miami was a very quiet town in those days and we were asked to move.

We did, a few blocks away, to Madeira 25A, an apartment building that has also gone condo, and gone are the wooden stairs with the telling creak that would let me know Abuela was coming down the stairs. Gone, too, are the Coliseum, a great place to bowl, hang out and listen to Top 40 in the jukebox, and the old Coral Gables library, which I remember every time I smell the rain.

My dad opened a travel agency, Caribbean Cruises, on Ponce de Leon Boulevard next to the Coral Theatre. Neither has been there for years. My mom went to work at the Shelborne Hotel in Miami Beach as an executive secretary to the general manager, which meant she ran the place. That is where I had my honeymoon a couple of years later and where, a couple of years ago, I went for karaoke.

My parents made those lean early exile years a warm and fun experience. We had an old car that my dad named “Can you give me a little push,” and we took car trips to Matheson Hammock and Crandon Park. We sang along with musician Mitch Miller and played Clue and Monopoly and we were active on the Cuba issue and even slept in Bayfront Park once to protest something WCKT news anchor Wayne Farris had said.

My boyfriend and many friends were in the Brigade 2506 that invaded Cuba in 1961. He went to prison and the experience changed his life and the lives of Cubans everywhere. But my parents helped make the memories of those times mostly good ones and, at 16, wounds heal fast.

In Miami, I discovered tuna fish sandwiches on plain white bread and French fries with ketchup. I also discovered prejudice. Looking for places to rent, we saw signs that read: “No blacks. No dogs. No Cubans.” The counters at Woolworth and Grant’s were segregated, so were water fountains and buses.

The good old times were not good for everyone and it almost seems impossible that those memories could co-exist with so many wonderful ones: driving up to Jimmy’s Hurricane on U.S. 1 and Bird Road, where servers on roller skates would come to the cars, just like in the movies; parties at the Venetian Pool, Friday nights at the Pizza Palace, window shopping on Miracle Mile and snacking at Jahn’s Ice Cream Parlor (where John Martin’s Irish Pub now stands). Sundays, after mass, the go-to spot was Walgreens downtown.

There were Friday night dances at the Coral Gables Youth Center and sock hops at the school gym, where rock ‘n roll was danced the way many have only seen on TV. There was the thrill of a pep rally and the way the air smelled around football season – I don’t know about your high school, but we were the Cavaliers, and that meant something!

There was a Howard Johnson’s inside the old Coral Gables bus station and we would stop on our way home from school for their famous “caramel” ice cream ( Dulce de Leche did not come into its own until 40 years later).

My younger brother was born at the old St. Francis Hospital in Miami Beach in 1961 and one year later, I graduated from Gables High, went to Dade County Junior College and had my first part-time job at Jackson Byron’s in downtown Miami. My first real job was as clerk typist at the Welfare Department; my husband worked three blocks away at what used to be Mary Jane Shoes on Flagler. We had met at the Vedado Tennis Club in Havana as teenagers, reunited here and got married at the Church of the Little Flower in Coral Gables in 1963. Our three children and four of our grandchildren have been born and raised in Miami.

When I first came to what is now my city, there was hardly anything open after 7 p.m. The Freedom Tower was the tallest building and Dadeland Mall was considered the “boondocks.” Our now ubiquitous Cuban coffee could only be had at home – Jose Enrique Souto, Sr., a family friend and the owner of Bustelo and Café Pilon, would deliver bags to our home from his truck.

My husband developed his professional career in computer systems at Eastern Airlines and, after its demise, became an executive at System One and EDS. When writing got the best of me, I began working at Harper’s Bazaar in Spanish, followed by a stint publishing Eventos Miami, a local social/cultural magazine. Miami in the ‘80s was ripe for that decadent scene: Ensign Bitters, Cats, The Mutiny, The Jockey Club and Regine’s in the Grand Bay, where Julio Iglesias visited often and the Dom Perignon flowed easily.

I’m presently retired from advertising, and we just celebrated our 50th wedding anniversary, right here in Kendall. Most of our family lives here and has grown with Miami. Is it perfect? No. But it is ours. And it is home. So when someone tells me we have the rudest drivers and we’re a banana republic and yada, yada, yada, I say “just move, chico.”

In 1951, I was young and it was the summer of my junior year in high school. I left St. Louis to join my older brother, a waiter at Martha Raye’s nightclub. It seemed to me to be an interesting life and he had agreed, after some pleading, to let me join him – as long as I worked and paid my own expenses. So, after apparently every possible stop in Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia and Florida, my non-air conditioned Greyhound bus arrived in Miami Beach and I saw, for the first time in my life, the ocean, framed by palm trees, sand and the just rising sun — and I was hooked.

My brother lied about my age and my “several years” of experience to get me a union card and a job as a busboy. My “experience” consisted of an hour or so of practice carrying dishes and glasses piled upon an up-turned coffee table. From the late ‘40s through the ‘50s and ‘60s the Collins area between 20th and 25th Streets was one of the liveliest in Miami Beach. Martha’s Five O’Clock Club was on the corner of 20th and Collins; Collins and 22nd housed “Wolfies,” the quintessential New York delicatessen. The Grate, the Pin Up, the Place Pigalle and the Night Owls clubs were within blocks; the Embers restaurant and Dubrow’s cafeteria were nearby; Junior’s deli and the old Roney Plaza hotel were just off 23rd Street. The 22nd Street public beach, between the Roney and the Sea Gull hotel, was well known by natives for its homosexual clientele, both male and female, and occasional bewildered tourists, wondering just what they had stumbled on to. My daytime job was working for three dollars a day and tips as a “cabana boy” at the Sea Gull, handing out towels, setting up beach chairs and umbrellas, keeping an eye on guests in the pool and ocean and selling them on the local water ski schools, hand-woven palm hats, Monkey Jungle tours, scuba lessons and other “opportunities” for which, if they bought, I received a one percent commission.

In the 1950s, the Five O’Clock Club was a popular, small nightclub offering two shows a night and three on weekends. The club was named for dispensing free drinks to anyone still at the bar at 5:00 a.m. The 5:00 a.m. sessions were populated primarily by after-work waiters, waitresses and musicians from other clubs, an occasional hooker and sometimes, a celebrity or two. The club had a three-drink minimum and, if you didn’t order food at the 6 p.m. dinner show, you paid a separate cover charge. The experienced nightclub goer nursed a glass of wine, paid the minimum or cover and never, ever ordered food from what was one of the worst kitchens on the Beach. Martha’s was where I learned to maneuver trays of dirty dishware through narrow aisles of tiny, tourist-filled tables and sometimes helped the bartender water down the bourbon, scotch and rye. I also learned that the “snowbirds,” particularly those who had perhaps had a drink too many, were often easy marks for inflated bar tabs. Martha’s was a lesser club, not as big or flashy as Copa City, the Beachcomber or the Latin Quarter but, when Martha was on the bill, it catered to loyal locals and aging movie-going tourists who remembered her from her ‘30s and ‘40s Hollywood musical comedies and who appreciated her off-color comedy routines and very considerable talent as a jazz pianist and vocalist. The five o’clock shows also featured lesser comics, male or female vocalists on their way up, or down the showbiz ladder and, sometimes, a movie-star friend of Martha’s.

I sometimes frequented the Rockin’ MB lounge which featured saxophone duos, drums and no-name vocalists, performing from an elevated “stage” behind the narrow bar. The band played mostly tunes like Bill Haley’s “Rock Around the Clock,” always at full volume. The sound cast out on Collins from late night to early morning and the entrance sheltered a large, bored gatekeeper, seated on a stool, who casually checked IDs and denied entrance to nobody. The offices above the MB also housed a phone-filled “wire room” handling bookies’ action. This was still Meyer Lansky/Al Capone/pre-Kefauver Miami and the horse parlors, “private” casinos and bolito shops had not yet been shut down as consequence of the crusading senator’s traveling hearings on crime and corruption (Kefauver’s first hearing was in Miami in 1951). What wasn’t legally wagered at Hialeah or Gulfstream on the horses or at dog tracks on the greyhounds or at jai alai frontons was gambled with bookies in cabanas by the pool at the ocean front hotels — like the one at the Sea Gull.

The Rockin MB’s clientele, like that at the Sea Gull and other beachfront hotels, were mostly young tourists, often female, in groups of twos and threes — secretaries, teachers and office workers, down from East Chicago, Indiana, Cleveland or other cities up north lured to Miami Beach by the airlines and hotels advertising “3 days and 2 nights (or 7 days and 6 nights) of sun and fun” on the “American Plan” where airfare, hotel, and most meals were included in the package. For example, in the 1950s you could stay at the Di Lido or Shore Club and other ocean-front hotels for less than $27 a day and for an additional $25 get breakfast and dinner. The American Plan became very popular in the 1960s and its utilization by mega-hotels like the Fontainebleau and Eden Roc with in-house nightclubs and New York/Hollywood level shows and entertainers marked the beginning of the end for clubs like Martha’s as well as the bigger entertainment venues.

I met celebrities besides Martha — had my picture taken with Jake LaMotta and Rocky Graziano at the Sea Gull, parked a car for Elizabeth Taylor and Eddie Fisher, made sure Irving Berlin’s jock strap and bathing suit were dry for his morning dip, and was able to finance my “other” education at the University of Miami — thanks to Miami Beach and the generosity of tourists.

My sojourn to South Florida started before I moved here in 1957. My sister and brother-in-law were here from New York on a winter vacation on December 26, 1947. The metropolitan area of New York had a snowstorm of 26 inches in a 24-hour period. It was a record then and may still be to this day. My sister called my father to find out the conditions and my father told them to stay in Miami, the city was paralyzed, no transportation, nothing was going on. They decided to stay and move permanently to South Florida. They came back to gather their personal belongings.

I started coming down in 1950 when my nephew was born. I went to jai alai every night and sat in the balcony for 50 cents. Back then jai alai was the place to be, especially on a Saturday night. The highlight of my trip was when we would go to Leonard’s La Peña on Bird Road, where I think the Palmetto Expressway is today. The menu, if I am not mistaken, was a shrimp cocktail, steak or lobster, stuffed baked potato and, for dessert, hot apple pie with a slice of American cheese — all for $3.95 (plus tip).

I moved to Florida in 1957, a day after the New York Yankees lost to the Milwaukee Braves in the World Series. My parents followed me one month later. They bought a house one block north of the Tamiami Trail and Southwest 60th Avenue. There is an elementary school called Fairlawn, which also had a park with a baseball field. Playing there one day I was recruited by a team that was practicing. They mentioned a league they played in at Shenandoah Park off Southwest 22nd Avenue and 19th Street and asked me if I wanted to join their team. Naturally I said yes. It was a church league and I played for St. Matthew’s Lutheran one year and Shenandoah Baptist the following year.

My first job in Florida was at the Food Fair warehouse on Northwest 71st Street and 32nd Avenue. I believe at the time they were the largest supermarket chain in South Florida. Other supermarkets at the time were Margaret Ann and Kwik Chek, which eventually merged with Winn Dixie, their main competition. Other stores came and went such as Grand Union, Albertson’s, and Shell on Northwest 58th Street. Publix was not as prevalent around South Florida in those days, but of course they have come a long way since then.

In 1960 I bought a hardware store on Northwest 183rd Street and 7th Avenue. The Palmetto Expressway only extended from the Trail (Southwest 8th Street) to Golden Glades. They used to call the Palmetto “Dead Man’s Highway” since there were no overpasses, or very few. You had to drive way below the speed limit to avoid accidents since very few cars stopped or slowed down at the intersections. I think within a year they started building overpasses at key streets which opened the area to residences and businesses immediately.

Some familiar and favorite restaurants through the years were Gold Star Deli on the Trail, just east of 62nd Avenue, the Great Gables on Ponce and the Trail, The Pub (with Whitey the host) on Coral Way, Royal Castles all over, Shorty’s BBQ, Captain’s Tavern, and Frankie’s Pizza on Bird Road, which is still there under family ownership. Dressel’s Dairy Farm on Milam Dairy Road had rides for the children and the thickest malt shakes anywhere.

Miami Beach in the ‘50s and ‘60s was second only to Las Vegas in live entertainment — from Roberta Sherwood and Don Rickles at Murray Franklin’s to Charlie Callas and Shecky Greene at the Deauville Star Theatre and Buddy Hackett and Joan Rivers at the Diplomat. Movie theaters included the Miracle on Miracle Mile, the Tower on the Trail, the State and Claughton theaters.

I have been happily married to my wife Elaine for 52 years (45 for her and seven for me – our joke). We have three children (and one grandchild) and, 45 years on, still live in our house off Miller Road and Southwest 92nd Avenue.

I was an avid tennis player for 30 years and dazzled many courts such as the Dadeland Inn, Marlin Racquet Club, Kendalltown and Courts at the Falls until my shoulder and knees finally gave out.

In between all this I enjoyed a long and successful career in real estate, where our company built, developed and managed warehouses, retail strip centers and private residences, mostly between Bird Road and Southwest 120th Street, and also along South Dixie Highway and Kendall Drive out west, when it was largely undeveloped. It has been a great ride. Thanks for the memories, South Florida (Miami).

On Nov. 1, 1987, at 30 years old, I left my home and family in Haiti to search for a better life. The economic and political situation was unbearable, and my family was being abused by the Duvalier regime. I promised my parents I would come back for them.

On that day, I boarded a boat headed to Miami with 100 other Haitians in hopes of a safe arrival; sadly, not all of us made it. When we finally reached the coast of Miami, some people had died of dehydration and starvation. I came to this city with only the clothes on my back and the promise I had made to my parents.

During my first year, I struggled working a series of odd jobs to support my family until Dec. 1, 1988, when I joined MDM Hotel Group as a housekeeper at Dadeland Marriott Hotel. Shortly after, I was promoted to room attendant and then in May of 1993, I was the first associate to hold the position of laundry supervisor. I met my husband in 1988, and we got married in 1992 when I was expecting my second child. While I was working and raising my children, I attended night school and received my nursing degree.

In 1997, I was thrilled to fulfill my promise to my parents and was able to bring them to the United States. After just a few years of living in the United States, we received the devastating news that my mom was diagnosed with lung cancer. I kept my faith and prayed every day for the improvement of my mother’s health.

A few months later, I received a phone call at the hotel from my mother’s oncologist telling me that my mother had only a few days to live and to pick her up and spend as much time with her as I could. Then a miracle happened: Just a few days later, my mother was cancer free.

My mother lived a beautiful life and lived until July 2013. Sadly, shortly after my mother’s miracle, my father was diagnosed with throat cancer, which quickly ascended to his brain.

I am the sole provider in my home, not only supporting my family here but also my family in Haiti, and I not only work as a laundry supervisor, but also as an on-call banquet server. There are days where I work in the laundry department until the afternoon, change in the locker room into my banquet uniform, and go straight to work. Sometimes I work a banquet until 3 a.m., get an hour of sleep, and start getting ready for work at 4 a.m. . Every single day, I give 100 percent to my work.

Being the only supervisor who speaks Creole at my workplace, I volunteer when needed to translate. Even though I always have personal matters taking place in my life, I try my best to give back to the community. When the earthquake hit Haiti, I immediately organized a successful donation drive and volunteered my time. I was a major driver of the hotel’s “Haiti Relief Drive” that was hosted as a Spirit to Serve Community Program. I wanted to help the people who were affected, especially the families of my coworkers.

Throughout my 25-year career for Marriott, I have been honored with multiple awards. I was Associate of the Month in April 1991 and May 1999. In 1999, I was also recognized as Associate of the Year. Since 2006, I have won Manager of the Month several times, and in April 2013, I won Leader of the Month. In 2013, I joined the “Quarter Century Club” for Marriott International, an exclusive club for those associates who have been with the company for 25 years. I am grateful and humbled to work for a company that truly appreciates its employees.

In 2013, I was awarded the prestigious “J. Willard Marriott Award of Excellence,” the highest honor given by Marriott International to only 10 employees every year. This was a tremendous honor considering that Marriott is located in 74 countries with more than 325,000 associates worldwide. In May 2014, I traveled to Washington, D.C., where I received my award in front of executives of Marriott International and had the incredible experience of having dinner with top executives.

Throughout all the hardships I suffered during my life in both Haiti and the United States, I feel blessed for the opportunities I have had. Working for Marriott International has helped support my family and me for 25 incredible years. It has also allowed me to fulfill the American dream.

I wanted to spend my retirement entertained with a million things to do each and every day. My husband Steve, on the other hand, wanted to spend his retired life in the sun, fishing for permit. He said, “Key West.” I said, “New York.” I was determined to remain in New York, and Steve was just as determined to move to Florida.

Steve hated the cold and the sleet and the snow. And he loved fishing and baseball.

Steve and I visited Florida on vacation in 1957, and we stayed at the Nautilus Hotel. Even the names of the hotels conjured up visions of far-away, exotic lands — Casablanca, Sans Souci, Marseilles, Fontainebleau, Eden Roc, and Seville.

In 1972, my aunt rented an apartment next to the Diplomat Hotel where, each night, famous stars performed, and she would take us to her favorite restaurants: Rascal House, Pumpernik’s, Corky’s, and the ever delicious Tivoli.

In the end, I gave in — with a compromise. We would move to South Florida but not to Key West.

So in 1994, we moved into the same building on the beach where my aunt lived, next to the waiting-to-be-imploded Diplomat Hotel. I soon discovered that the heat didn’t bother me at all, and having a pool where people congregated and created friendships certainly helped us quickly get used to our new home.

Strolling down Lincoln Road years ago, when the middle of the street was still open to traffic, was always thrilling. And Steve and I loved Hialeah Park, the race track where thoroughbreds ran and beautiful flamingos fed along the ponds in the sculptured gardens. The elegant betting area bore no resemblance to any race track we had ever been to; Hialeah was a gem of mahogany-sculptured paneling that conjured up old-fashioned splendor and always made me feel out of place making a two-dollar bet.

I liked to visit Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden because not only were the gardens colorful and fragrant, but otters frolicked in the small pond there. Steve and I always enjoy visiting the Biltmore Hotel, in Coral Gables, where we walk around the immense swimming pool and recall that Johnny Weissmuller and Esther Williams swam there. The GableStage theater, housed at the Biltmore, offers memorable performances that each season garner awards.

Steve enjoys sporting events, and he followed Tiger Woods on the greens of the Doral Country Club, and on Sunday afternoons we would go to Joe Robbie Stadium, now known as Sun Life Stadium, to watch the Miami Dolphins play.

Miami also has wonderful museums, such as the Bass and the Wolfsonian. One of the most astonishing exhibits I ever saw was a display at the Bass Museum: a kitchen, living room, and a garden all made out of beads; even the kitchen sink and faucets were made from beads.

The Holocaust Memorial on Miami Beach always brings me to tears. Secluded in a garden and surrounded by sculptures depicting the horrors of the concentration camps, a giant hand emerging from the exhibit’s center. The hand itself is covered with naked, emaciated bodies climbing up to the wrist, evoking the horrors and the sadness of the millions lost.

I still love the old, Art Deco buildings of South Beach, now renovated into chic boutique hotels. Latin music erupts from Gloria Estefan’s restaurant on the west side of Ocean Drive. On the beach side of the street, we always would stop to admire the sand sculptures. I miss the artist who created these fanciful cities out of sand stretching a quarter of a block in length and lasting perhaps for months. After a while, he would start all over, a new creation from nothing, but now he, too, seems to be gone for good. Also gone — and sorely missed — is that fabulous panoramic mural on the wall of the Fontainebleau Hotel depicting an Eden-like garden; it always felt as if we were driving right through the arch and into the hotel.

I used to love the fatty corned-beef sandwiches at Rascal House, and now at Jerry’s Famous Deli, and I revel in the tastes of Chinese food at Christine Lee’s.

When Steve and I moved to South Florida, I found all the things I really wanted: serious, great theater and musicals, better than what is offered on Broadway.

Better yet, my children now live in South Florida, too, and heaven, in the shape of my grandchildren, came with them. Now I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else. I read somewhere that you are truly lucky if you live near a beach. Well, then we are all very lucky to live in South Florida, surrounded by beautiful beaches.

From my windows, the ocean is a stunning aquamarine mural. “Florida? You must be kidding!” has turned into “Florida? I am sure glad I live here!”

Every night after dinner, the four of us would gather around the cramped dining table in our apartment on Kendall Drive, quizzing one another, working on our English pronunciation, memorizing medical concepts, multiplication tables, SAT vocabulary — whatever had to be memorized — drying every stubborn tear because there was not a second to waste.

We were like a startup. When my parents decided to leave Cuba and moved us to Miami in 2002, they were determined to build our own future from scratch. My father, Héctor Chicuén, an electrical engineer, would find work at Florida Power & Light. My mother, María Victoria García, a pediatrician, would certify her medical degree. My younger sister María Cristina Chicuén and I would attend college. This was our business plan. What we lacked in resources, we made up for in drive, an unspoken no-excuse philosophy, an overabundance of togetherness.

Within our family enterprise, teamwork was essential. Whether at a Home Depot, a local Christmas tree shop or a cement factory, my dad would pack his weeks with two and sometimes three jobs in order to make ends meet so that my mom could devote her time to the medical certifications. Some days, when the orange juice disappeared from our kitchen as we ran out of money, when stress drove my dad to twitch his eyes like a flickering emergency light, my mom would close the textbooks.

“No es fácil,” she’d say as she grabbed a mop and drove the short distance to Pinecrest, where good cleaning services were always welcome at the ranch-style estates carved deep in the lush, tropical landscape. Or we’d head to a local gym together. My mother took care of toddlers while their parents exercised, and I prepared protein shakes at the gym’s cafeteria.

These were my high school years, which now blur in my mind, forming a mosaic of sleep deprivation, five-minute phone calls to relatives in Cuba and endless homework for as many advanced courses as I could fit in my schedule. On a rare occasion, as a reward for good grades or a promotion, as a little pause in all the hustle, we would treat ourselves to a family meal at Denny’s.

“Hi, hello, I would like a coffee with milk,” my mom would request in her rehearsed English version of “Hola, qué tal, un café con leche por favor.” The waiter, of course, would proceed to bring a glass of American coffee and a glass of milk.

We also used to rent movies from Blockbuster. We had given up on movie theaters since our first experience, on the release of the original Harry Potter movie. Dressed in our best clothes for what we thought was a special night out, we were baffled by the teenagers in shorts and tank tops — “hasta en chancletas” — flooding Kendall Regal Cinema.

Time had never been so precious to us. Every hour of my father’s work meant $6, $8, $9, $14, $18 to sustain the entire family. One more hour of study brought my mother closer to certifying her medical degree. One more hour at school meant my sister and I were more fluent in English, more prepared for a complex education system we were determined to conquer. That’s why we would arrive at family gatherings with a textbook under our arms, or pass on parties altogether if there was an opportunity for overtime work or a tutoring session.

We took advantage of every resource and free lunch. Even free dinners. On the morning of our first Thanksgiving, the staff from my sister’s elementary school gifted us with a sumptuous turkey we had no idea how to cook. “We’ll roast it like pork,” we thought, as we did in Cuba for every major celebration. Soaked in our traditional marinade of garlic and bitter orange, accompanied by yuca, fried plantains, steamed white rice and black beans, our own bicultural turkey was soul-nourishing. And we were deeply thankful.

Steady, we kept studying and working as hard as we could. It was well into our third year in Miami when the unmistakable light of good fortune crept through our windows. My father received the dream offer from Florida Power & Light. My mother passed her medical board exams and was accepted to a residency program at a prestigious hospital in New York. I received a letter of admission and a generous scholarship to attend Harvard University.

Miami refused to let us go. As we readied to embark on a new adventure in the Northeast, just a few weeks before my high school graduation, my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer.

We would not give up. We had won the most difficult battles — separation from our family, poverty and unemployment, loneliness, the inability to express our most basic needs and feelings. We would not give in to illness.

For months, my mother fought through chemotherapy, radiotherapy and hours of surgery until she recovered and claimed the spot she had earned so rightfully at her medical residency. Today, she is a primary-care physician in Little Havana, an area of critical medical need.

My father’s career at Florida Power & Light spans over 10 years. As he has risen through different roles and departments, he has been able to coach other recent immigrants on successful applications for employment at the company.

My sister is now in her third year of college at Stanford University. Every summer, she returns to Miami, where she has interned with the Miami Heat and farmers markets to complement her studies in health policy and urban food systems. She is preparing herself to promote wellness in our city after she graduates.

I am at Miami Dade College. From my post in the college president’s office, I recognize in the faces of many of our students the same determination and thirst for opportunity that first brought my family to Miami, and which continue to drive every one of our individual and collective endeavors.

This city has given us a brighter present than we could have ever imagined.

It’s our turn to pay it forward.

Maria Carla Chicuén is the author of ‘Achieve the College Dream: You Don’t Need to Be Rich to Attend a Top School.’

I grew up on the North Shore of Boston in the ‘50s and ‘60s in a small blue-collar town with its four seasons. It took me years to figure out why every year I would get “blue” in August. I loved summer, beaches, the sun, and walking around in flip flops. In August, I knew the winter, the cold and snow were coming and I did not like that fact.

Once, in my early 20s, I begged my girlfriends to take a trip somewhere in warmer climate where there were beaches, sun, and I could walk around in flip flops. The three of us traveled to Bermuda and, on my second day there, while I was sunning on famous Horse Shoe beach, along came my future husband with two of his friends, all from Italy.

Marcello and I hit it off right away, even though I thought he was German and told him that. (He had blond hair and green eyes.) With his hands flying around, he told me he was Italian and from Tuscany. Six months later, we were married and were trying to decide whether to live in Boston, Bermuda, or somewhere else.

Marcello told me that when he was a little boy he always dreamed of Miami Beach. He also is a beach bum, likes the sun, heat, and walking around in flip flops. So, the bold decision was made that we would move to South Florida.

Marcello flew down in late 1972 and stayed with my second cousin until he found a job and an apartment for what was now a family of three (our daughter Diana was born in Boston in October 1972). He found a job at famous Valenti’s Restaurant on U.S. 1 in Kendall, and worked there for several years.

Marcello’s goal was to own and operate an Italian restaurant within five years of our settling in Miami in early 1973. He made that dream come true in 1977 when he opened Il Pappagallo Italian Cuisine in Perrine on U.S. 1. It was a small restaurant that could seat approximately 55 people, and it was very successful for almost 30 years. Marcello and several of his original staff – Karin from Germany, Anna from Italy, and Ugo from Argentina – were with us for many years. People came from all over Miami-Dade, and even from the Keys and Broward County, to dine in our quaint little restaurant.

Our first residence was in King’s Creek apartments across from the huge Dadeland Mall. I would walk there with my newborn daughter and shop at Jordan Marsh and Burdines. A couple of years later, we moved to the Briar Bay/Falls area and have owned our home for 34 years. I now walk to The Falls and shop at Macy’s.

Our second daughter Cristina was born at Baptist Hospital in Kendall on Christmas Day, 1974. On Cristina’s 10th birthday we hired a white limo and had the limo driver dress up as Santa and we ate at the beautiful Reflections restaurant in Bayside. For fun, we would take day trips and a picnic lunch to the Keys, Matheson Hammock, Cape Florida and Miami Beach. Life was good.

Our daughters went to Killian and Palmetto schools and received their degrees from Florida International University. They now live in Central Florida but still love Miami and would like to move back.

While Marcello was at his beloved restaurant, I worked for the federal government in Miami for 36 years as an international trade specialist for the U.S. Department of Commerce. In this position, I was very lucky to have met many members of the international community, exporters, and local, state and federal government officials. It has been a joy to see how Miami International Airport and PortMiami have grown into world class operations. In 2009, I received the International Women’s Day Award from the World Trade Center Miami and in 2011, the International Business Woman of the Year Award from the Organization for Women in International Trade.

The Santucci family will always remember how Miami was a small city and how it has changed since we arrived in 1973. Back then, the tallest building in downtown Miami was a bank and, of course, the Dade County Courthouse on Flagler. Miami Beach was full of rental apartments for the elderly and you would see them sitting out on the front porches in rocking chairs, enjoying the salt air and sunshine.

We did survive Hurricane Andrew even though we lost the restaurant business for four months, and our home was half destroyed. We never thought of leaving, but only thought of rebuilding. On the first day of reopening our restaurant we gave all proceeds to Zoo Miami (then Metro Zoo) and to a homeless shelter.

Miami is and will always be our home town. We love that it has evolved into an international city with people from many cultures and countries. On our small cul de sac we have families from China, El Salvador, Brazil, Cuba, and other U.S. states.

Over the years, we took at least 15 cruises, and have made many trips to Italy to visit Marcello’s family and to New England to visit my family. But, we are always pleased to return to our home, Miami.

I was always amazed at one coincidence Marcello and I shared. He and I were both born near the 42nd parallel north – he in Tuscany, Italy, and I near Boston, Massachusetts. And from our early childhood years, we both knew we wanted to live south in a warmer climate.

Marcello and I are now retired near the 26th parallel north in Briar Bay/The Falls, and are enjoying the sun, beaches, and walking around in our flip flops! Dreams do come true…..

I was born 70 years ago at Jackson Memorial Hospital. My father had done his surgical training there in the late 1930s, following his mother’s move to Miami from Tennessee.

My great-grandparents came to Coral Gables in 1928, and my mother’s family wintered here and later took the grandparents’ home. My parents’ wedding reception on Nov. 18, 1941, was the last major event at the Biltmore Hotel before it became an Army hospital.

Dad was happy to find a house after WW II, since properties were scarce. It was located near Bird and Red roads, which had Allen’s Drug Store, Woolworths, and B Thrifty. Our street was next to the rock pit where we played with the dreaded BB guns. It is now the site of the YMCA. In 1950, we moved a few blocks east to Coral Gables.

Starting in 1947, I went to JMH with my father, and after ninth grade, Dad got me summer jobs at the hospital to see if I really wanted to be a doctor. The hospital was segregated, but I worked with and under African Americans, which was very enlightening for me.

In 1958, my first summer at JMH, my monthly salary as a pharmacy tech was $212. I worked eight summers with no salary increase. In 1970, I treated Cuban refugees from the Freedom Flights in the rooms of the old ER.

Dad was willing to pay 10 cents for the Venetian Causeway instead of using MacArthur Causeway to get to my aunt’s flower shop on 36th Street. While riding the flower shop truck in the 1950s, I marveled at the wonderful new hotels in Miami Beach. I remember Dixie Highway (U.S. 1), with its two lanes, and along the two lanes of Kendall Drive, there was only tall saw grass.

In 1950, my father’s commute improved when he moved to the 550 Building on Brickell. It was the first office building on “mansion road.”

Because of a shortage of schools, 50 children were in my Coral Gables Elementary first grade classroom and we had to share desks. I became very proficient at air-raid drills. I wasn’t allowed to go to the Venetian Pool because of the fear of polio, and I was among the first to get the Salk vaccine.

Every Saturday, for 25 cents, I spent most of the day at the Miracle Theater. When I was older, I never used the double seats at the Coral Theater, but was jealous of those who did. We took buses everywhere, including to downtown Miami.

Our family ate dinners at Red Coach Grill, Edith & Fritz, and Batista’s, later called Delmonico’s, at Ponce de Leon Blvd. and Douglas Road. For seafood, we usually ate at Loffler Brothers, and on big occasions at Chesapeake’s. I would eat four or five mini cheeseburgers at Royal Castle, and never worried about it. Shorty’s BBQ seemed a long trip from the Gables but worth the drive.

At Christmas time, we drove to see the house lights, especially on South Alhambra Circle. We also went to Burdines to see the train exhibit and to ride the Ferris wheel. Of course, one had to visit the outdoor display at Holsum Bakery.

The heat at school and home wasn’t much fun during the warm months. The large attic fan helped a little, but nothing like our first wall AC unit when I was 10. During summer school, I drenched my starched shirts at the UM “cardboard campus,” which had no air conditioning. That site became part of the “new” War Memorial Youth Center. Because Tahiti Beach cost 10 cents, we went to Matheson or Crandon parks, which had the zoo. In high school, we water skied by the mangroves near Key Biscayne Yacht Club and would leave our stuff on the beaches behind private homes.

Other thoughts about growing up here: At the Coliseum, I enjoyed seeing Golden Glove boxing matches and the Harlem Globetrotters, and later enjoyed bowling when it was converted. Initially, in the Gables, we could drive through the Douglas Entrance and along University Drive through UM to Ponce de Leon Junior High. The air raid siren sounded every Saturday at noon and the UM carillon played at 5 p.m. on Sundays.

As to the demographic changes in South Florida, a few years ago I started studying Spanish, which tells it all. Coral Gables and the rest of South Florida is certainly different from my youth, but I still love it and am thankful to be home.