The Intricacies of Cubanness

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Recommended: The culture of Cuba

The Intricacies of Cubanness

“Hey bro, en Hialeah me quedo,” I said to my friends Eddie Safille, Alex “G” Gonzalez and Orlie Castelblanco as we finished up our Cuban coffee while playing a game of dominos. Eddie, in an enthusiastic voice, answers, “You better believe I’m staying in Hialeah. This place is our home.” We all love Hialeah, as city in Miami-Dade County located a few miles from Miami city limits and is predominantly Cuban. Hialeah is one of the only cities in this country where we don’t feel like a minority. We cling to our Cuban culture like a python clings to its prey while it squeezes the life form its lungs with its muscular body. I feel a strong bond with my Cuban heritage, every time I play my bongos, every time the Salsa beat moves my feet across the floor like a hurricane taking a town by storm, or every time I drink some café while playing dominos in the park or behind La Carreta restaurant. One of my favorite memories is of my friends and I playing a game of dominos at Bayfront Park downtown with Latin music in the background, feeling the ocean breeze brush against our faces, and seeing all the skyscrapers tower over us in a seemingly endless bundle of beauty and majesty. The city, with its sun-splashed avenues has treated the Cuban people with love and respect and has contributed to my pride in where I’m from.

I like to think of my cultural heritage as a chocolate chip cookie. The dough of the cookie is an Americanized version of both Cuban and Lebanese cultures making up the majority of the cookie, while the chips are a mix of many cultures that have influenced me in smaller ways, such as my father’s Irish roots. The reason the Cuban and Lebanese cultures because the most predominate is mostly as a result of how I grew up. All my life I have lived with my parents, and my mother’s parents.

Although both my Cuban and Lebanese influences have greatly impacted my life, my Cuban-American culture is without doubt the most influential of all. The first language I spoke was Spanish. Most of my friends are also of Cuban decent, and the city that I grew up in, Miami, is a strong hold of Cuban power in the United States.

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