the time I enrolled, the school had moved to an old warehouse that had, among other things, been used as a dance studio. It was also rumored that Al Capone stored wines and liquor at the warehouse during Prohibition. Three hundred students were enrolled from grades seven through twelve, in a building that had no windows. Today Belen is located in the western end of Miami-Dade County in facilities that resemble a small college campus. Not quite the physical structure it had in Cuba, an imposing, Pentagon-like structure, but an excellent facility nevertheless, with far more amenities than when I attended.
Today’s students at Belen are obviously in a much better financial position than those who attended during my years. These students now include my children’s generation. For one thing, my generation can afford to buy our children cars. When I was growing up, a giant group of us would try to squeeze into an old Volkswagen. Only a handful of us, at most, had parents who could afford a car. In fact, I used to go out on dates in a dairy and produce truck that a friend would use during the day to make deliveries.
While at Belen, at age fourteen, I landed my first job through CETA, the Comprehensive Employment Training Act. This was a program designed to provide jobs for youngsters from families at or below the poverty level. I remember the threshold was really high, but I met it. I earned $1.10 an hour, working as a janitor after school at Belen. Every day, I would start immediately after school to clean and do some of my assigned homework before practice (I had practice every day after school year-round since I was playing sports every season) or I would return to clean after practice. Throughout high school, I worked as a janitor, including weekends and in some cases during the summer as well. I also worked as a stock boy at the auto parts factory where my parents worked because the pay was a little better, helping the family out with the money I earned.
The student population at Belen was very small. Each grade was divided into an A class and a B class. I am not sure if it was by design, but during my six years at Belen, the A class seemed to perform better academically. Many of their parents came from a professional class. Many had been doctors or lawyers in Cuba. Although they too were struggling during those early years, they at least had a foundation that would serve them well in ultimately returning to financial success in America. As a result, their children had been exposed to more and often had more resources.
As you might expect, the B class housed the sports jocks, who also had a more rounded street education. I started out in seventh and eighth grades as part of the B class, which included a friend who had played baseball with me since we were kids. We both were still lured by the streets, being troublemakers and getting into fights. Going into ninth grade, my coach, Mariano Loret de Mola, one of my dad’s oldest friends, took the two of us out of the B class and put us in the A class. I wasn’t happy about the transfer since all my friends were in the B class. I really felt more at ease with the sports crowd than I did with the smart kids.
But an interesting thing happened when I went into the A class: peer competition. My athletic competitiveness was transferred to the classroom and I improved my grades dramatically. The coach knew that. That’s why he pulled me out. Getting into Belen in the first place was a defining moment in my life; being transferred to the A group was another.
People ask me today how I keep my crazy schedule. It started at Belen. I would finish class, do my janitorial work either before or after practice, finish practice at 7:00 P.M., go home, shower, eat—somewhere in between visit my girlfriend—then, probably after 9:00 P.M. start my school work. At Belen you couldn’t survive by simply cramming at the last minute. We had tests every week, several times a week. Basically, you were cramming every day. We would do our homework and projects as part of study groups. My classmates would come over to my house to study or I would go to their house. At midnight my parents, or their parents if I was at another student’s house, would prepare café con leche so we could stay awake and study. That was my regular schedule then. And it continues today.
At Belen, it was assumed that you were going to college. There was no question about that; the only question was the career you would choose. But yes, you were going to college and you were going to be a professional, any profession.
My career path was also heavily influenced by my ninth-grade government teacher, Patrick Collins (who is still at Belen). On the first day of class, he gave us a challenge, “Ok, you guys are driving down some old country road in Alabama and a big sheriff comes over and arrests you because you look Hispanic or he just doesn’t like you. What would you do? Do you know what your rights are?”
I wanted to know the answer, and it is at this the point that I began to focus on a legal career. There is also no doubt that my own personal experience of being uprooted from my country of birth, having a system fail because of the lack of the rule of law, and wondering how that was possible also played a significant role in my career decision. How can a country fail like this? Something must be structurally wrong with its institutions for that to happen. The pursuit of a legal career went hand in hand with a commitment to public service and social activism. The Jesuit education emphasizes the principles of always giving back; of remembering where you came from; and reaching out to help those who come after you, especially those less fortunate. That life should not be measured by the material riches one is able to secure, but rather by the value one adds to enhance the life of others. Our school’s motto: Men for Others.
My classmates and I did well academically at Belen. There were forty students in our graduating class. I believe twelve would go on to become doctors. Another significant group would become lawyers, and many others succeeded in engineering, business, and other professions. We are all still friends. Sending me to Belen was one of the best things my parents ever did for me. I will forever be grateful for the sacrifices they made to make that possible.
Chapter 2 The Lost Generation Finds Its Way
TRAINED IN THE principle of Men for Others, I left high school with a strong sense of public service, wanting to help others. However, in order to do so, I would have to navigate uncharted waters. Politically and culturally, I was part of the first group of Cuban Americans who grew up in the United States. Even though we were born in Cuba, most of us were too young to remember much of anything. America is what we knew, but Cuba was never far away. Our parents and grandparents would never let us forget. One minute you’re having dinner with your parents and the conversation revolves around Cuba and what is happening there. The next minute you’re watching television shows in English, going to American movies, reading American books, attending an American school, listening to American music. You are exposed to all the influences of growing up in America, much like any other child your age. You’re an American through and through.
This presented a huge challenge for those of us who grew up as members of the lost generation. I was raised in the 1960s and 1970s by a father who was very strict, very military, very old school. He even sported a crew cut. You don’t know how difficult it was for him to come to the realization that just because I wanted to have long hair, wear shorts,jeans, or sandals didn’t mean I was any less of a man. Culturally, in Cuba, men didn’t wear sandals. Men also didn’t wear shorts, especially if they were tight—that was a “gay” thing. Then there were tank tops or letting your hair grow long. Going to a dance at school wearing a tank top and stained jeans meant being stopped by my dad with the question, “What are you doing?”
There was this tremendous cultural clash between what my father was used to, how he was brought up, and this new reality in our new country. Thank God for my mom and my grandfather, who were both nearly always on my side: “It’s just the way it is. That’s how this country is. You have to understand,” they would tell my dad. “You have to adapt.” “No, I will never adapt” was his stern response.
Feeling comfortable in two often very different cultures created this same tension for most of my generation. We all went through much the same experience. A political gulf also separated my generation from that of my parents. Having been misled by a young charismatic leader
