Finding Mañana

Ojito watched her uncle talking with Mike and saw kindness in Mike’s eyes. Her uncle explained that Mike was going to help bring Ojito’s family and the other stranded passengers of the Valley Chief to Florida. Final preparations were made, and the boat began to pull away from the shore. Ojito, although she had long wanted to leave Cuba, found herself emotional. She went to sleep after looking at her native land one last time and woke the next morning feeling terrible. The journey to Key West was not long, but Ojito was prone to motion sickness and she was ill the entire time. When they arrived in Florida, she was tired and disoriented. The scene was chaotic: There were throngs of refugees, and everyone was given identification documents. Several members of Ojito’s family who were already living in the United States met their family at the refugee processing center in Key West. Although the refugees were detained in the Keys until their paperwork was sorted out, on the morning of May 12, Ojito and her family were able to go to her uncle’s home in Hialeah. There, Ojito was disappointed by the lack of skyscrapers and snow but did her best to adjust.