Category Archives: My Story

Balseros in Guantanamo bay, Cuba 1994-1995

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On Monday September 5, 1994 I was rescued at sea together with a group of Cubans escaping from the island.  We spent the whole day on a coast guard cutter rescuing other rafters until our boat was full of people.  After the rescue the coast guard took us to a huge ship in the middle of the ocean where we were processed an asked a few medical and basic questions such name and place of origin.

Since I knew English I was able to help the US military in their efforts.  This was known at the time as Operation Sea Signal, Joint Task Force 160. We spend a day aboard this big “mother ship” and after that we were transferred to the USS South Carolina.

The South Carolina was an impressive war ship with nuclear propulsion.  They took us to Guantanamo Bay on this ship, you could feel the raw power of this machine just by standing on its deck.  I found this picture online and I read the ship has been decommissioned.

Also, here is my picture when I arrived in Guantanamo bay, you can compare side-by-side with a picture taken at my old business warehouse in 2006. I was 125 pounds then…

We arrived at Guantanamo Bay on the morning of September 9, 1994, the place looked like nothing you are used to seeing in Cuba.  Guantanamo Bay looked like a well kept and maintained place to me.  The lawns, the buildings and pretty much every thing appeared to be in good condition.

We were further processed and our picture and finger prints were taken.  We were assigned ID numbers and a watch-like device was attached to our wrist, this device had a magnetic strip they used to ID us.  We were assigned to tents and given blankets and other supplies.  At that time we were approximately 35,000 Cuban immigrants on the base.

Cuban Business before and after.

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Family Business in 1958

I visited my cousin and he shared some stories with me about his father.  He pulled out an old photo album and showed me an old picture of himself in 1958 working at his dad’s business. The business was a small local cafeteria that served breakfast, coffee and sandwiches. He remembered how his dad used to place a wooden box beneath his feet so he could reach the counter and serve a glass of water to every customer.  I was able to take a “scan” of the picture with my camera.

His dad’s business, like all businesses, was nationalized (taken by the government) in 1960  at the beginning of the revolution.  I asked him if the place still existed today or not – “Let’s go and see for your self how the business is doing today”, he said.

We walked down a few blocks from his current house and there it was.  I was holding the 1958 picture in my hands and could not believe my eyes. The small cafeteria his father cherished so much and where he had so many good times helping out as a kid was destroyed.

Same Business in 2010

See it for yourself!  This was not a Transnational American company or a multi million dollar business; this was a simple neighborhood store privately owned by a hardworking man.

Today, more than 50 years later, the Cuban government is trying to promote small businesses, but those businesses existed before and were destroyed; just as this example shows, many other small business owners had the same unpleasant experience. The country does not need any magical solution, just let people dream and work to make their dreams come true.

Guantanamo Bay 1994 – 1995

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Here is my story written by my friends from icuban.com

Alexis Martin

Alexis at his warehouse in Miami fl 2006

Alexis Martin is a risk taker. In 1994, he and nine other Cubans left the island in an improvised boat, destination: the Florida.

The 35-year-old Martin was born in a small country side town in Matanzas, Cuba. From 1986 to 1990, he studied computers and electronics in Havana. However, Martin dreamed of a life that could never happen for him in Cuba.

Martin and the other balseros spent four very rough days at sea. With no motor for their boat, they were at the mercy of the ocean currents. On the fourth day a large storm blew up, buffeting the boat and threatening to tear it apart.

“We almost died,” says Martin. “The storm hit us at night and it was really bad. You would feel the boat banging the water like it was going to break. On Saturday morning we saw lights and we thought we were close to or possibly in Florida or Miami. Instead, we landed on a beach in Havana. The storm had taken us back to Cuba!” Most of Martin’s compatriots returned to their homes, defeated. However, Martin and a friend stayed at the beach where they met other rafters. Joining one of those teams, the pair took to the seas again early Monday morning.

“After three hours at sea, we saw a big U.S. Coast Guard ship,” Martin explains. “They picked us up and one week later I was in Guantanamo bay

Alexis Martin at the Guantanamo bay Computer Shcool

Alexis Martin at the Guantanamo bay Computer Shcool

At that time there were close to 35,000 Cubans in Guantanamo Bay. Initially conditions at the camp were poor, but over time they improved. Five months after he arrived in Guantanamo, Martin and several others had started a small school.

“We managed to create a school with the help of the military and some civilian organizations,” Martin says. “Some of us were teaching English and some of us were teaching computers. This was all voluntary. The U.S. military gave us old equipment and we refurbished it for use at the school. That was a great experience for me.”

Luck was kind to Martin in Guantanamo. There he met an Army colonel, Vincent Zike, who, impressed with his computer skills and entrepreneurship, befriended him. This friendship would later prove to be very valuable.

Martin left Guantanamo after 13 months, arriving in the United States United States in October, 1995, where he started working in a hospital in Miami as a surgery room orderly. Eventually he landed a computer-related technical position at Pollo Tropical Pollo Tropical a Miami-based fast food restaurant chain specializing in Caribbean food.

Later a he landed a computer support position in a Miami stock market software company. It wasn’t long before Martin decided to start his own computer support business.

“I always wanted to have my own business, so I went door to door in the business districts in Miami and handed out a flyer outlining my services ” Martin says. “Slowly I built my client base and although my practice was modest, I had great customers.”

Martin also created a website called Vendoborato.com, but even after investing $2,000 of his own money, the site never took off. One year Martin visited the Cuba Nostalgia show where he got the idea of creating commemorative coins featuring the Cuban coat or arms and those of each of the original 6 Cuban provinces.

Alexis Martin and Colonel Zike. Guantanamo Bay 1995

Alexis Martin and Colonel Zike. Guantanamo Bay 1995

“I learned that Colonel Zike had a coin manufacturing business in the United States called ChallengeCoins.com,” Martin says. “I contacted him and with his help and contacts, I created a Cuban commemorative coin collection. It was a nice collection and I sold a lot of coins to businesses in the Miami area.”

Martin’s wife Marta has always played a big role in his efforts. She provided practical business advice and expertise, ran the office, and did the accounting.

“She was with me delivering paper door to door in Miami and growing her own accounting practice at the same time I was starting my consulting business,” Martin says.

Martin’s original site was called MiamiCoinsManufacturing.com. Although the coins sold well, Martin saw the need to branch out. His idea was to start selling Cuban memorabilia online. With a new focus, the business needed a new name and MyCubanStore.com was born.

“One day a friend of mine was getting married and they required everyone to wear guayaberas,” Martin says. “I visited a local store to buy a guayabera and after talking to the owner who also was a manufacturer I started selling guayaberas at MyCubanStore.com.”

The guayaberas were such a hit that soon MyCubanStore.com changed from a memorabilia store to a clothing store. The site sells guayaberas and tropical inspired clothing to customers from around the world. The business has been so successful that Martin soon phased out of the consulting business to run his online store full time.

And the business that started as a small space in the Martin home, with Marta and his father-in-law Luis and kids helping out?

It has grown to fill a rented warehouse where online orders are filled and shipped each day. The guayabera business has been so strong that Martin’s company now manufactures guayabera shirts under their own label.

“We still sell a few Cuban memorabilia items, but mostly we sell clothing,” Martin says. “Our linen guayaberas have become a big hit and the line of Havana Shirts we carry is also very popular.”

For one lucky and hard working balsero, life in America is a dream come true.

About MyCubanStore.Com

My Cuban Store is an Internet purveyor of Latin American clothing and accessories. The privately held company privately held company

CONTACT: Alexis Martin, Owner of MyCubanStore.com, +1-800-657-0292, or general@mycubanstore.com

Web site: http://www.mycubanstore.com/

Cuba 1994

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On august 1994 there was a popular rebellion in Habana known as El Maleconazo. See this Amateur Video:

After the Soviet Union collapse and the end of the subsidies the Cuban Government find himself in a very difficult situation. Rationing were increased and it was hard to find food, the black market prices skyrocketed. The situation in the country was very volatile.

 The special period was at his highest peak read more here: ttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Period
 
Me and many of my generation had grown tired of empty promises of a better future and been asked all the time to sacrifice more. We were all anxious waiting for the big change or a way out.

The number of Cubans leaving Cuba in improvised rafts were growing by days and may desperate Cubans were recurring to hijacks to archive their dream of leaving their country. The Cuban government got frustrated by this and announced they will not longer prevent any one from leaving the island.

After the Cuban government decided not to prevent any Cubans from leaving the island a sea of people left Cuba in improvised rafts. I was one of them.

My Life in Cuba

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I grew up in a normal Cuban family; my father was a member of the communist party as well as many of my family members.

Me in the other hand always felt out of place. In the 80’s during my teenager years we were a “rebellious youth” listening to American music and not believing a word that came from the government or our parents which looked pretty much like the same. I and many of my friends were sent to schools were you had to do hard labor as part of the daily routine.

I always felt the communist system was designed to penalize individual expressions and we were trying as any other youth to find our own voices and expressions. I was reprehended by society and accused more than once of “Diversionismo Ideológico”  ( ideological distortion or something like that), basically you were not the “new men” they wanted to create.
On this type of system people learn to comply with the authority and even get afraid of your own thoughts. It’s a life of making believe and say what the other ones want you to say.

 I never played that game well, so my communist friends will never understand why I was not afraid of speaking my mind and they tried more than once to change me unsuccessfully. My rebellious mind took me in many not so good experiences, including expulsions of schools, meetings with the school directors or the communist party leader at school or at work.

I grow accustomed to staying on the sidelines while watching all the none sense take charge. At an earlier age I notice how everyone plays the government line and live a big hypocrisy.  I told to myself I will not do that and I always declined to participate in political acts.

For the most part my teenager years were plagued with confrontations with the government. Specially a government that regulates every aspects of your live (including what you eat).

I also had dreams, I’ve read about what people can accomplish in the USA and how individual efforts are rewarded. I always dreamed of going to the USA to try hard to create something and be someone.