THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, January 31, 1996 TAG: 9601310385
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY BILL SIZEMORE, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: PORTSMOUTH LENGTH: Long : 169 lines
The couple's circumstances are modest, and a little scary. They live in a sparsely furnished three-room apartment off Victory Boulevard. They work at low-wage jobs in an alien culture where they can barely speak the language.
But the way Antonio Aleman-Garces and Teresa Mercedes Alonso-Garanados look at it, they're embarking on an exhilarating new life of limitless opportunity.
They can breathe again.
The two are part of a new wave of Cuban refugees to come to this country since the United States normalized immigration policies with its Communist neighbor.
The portal to their new life was Guantanamo Bay Naval Station, the longtime American outpost on Fidel Castro's island that for the past 18 months has been a huge tent city for thousands of people fleeing economic and political turmoil in Cuba and Haiti.
That mission ends today as the last group of Cubans ships out of Guantanamo. The flow of refugees halted after the United States stopped granting Cuban migrants automatic entry into this country and Haiti's democratically elected government was restored to power.
Since last May, about 20,000 Cubans have been moved out of Guantanamo at the rate of 500 a week. They have resettled all over the United States, mainly through the help of church groups, private organizations and individuals who helped the refugees find new homes.
The closing of the refugee camp leaves ``Gitmo'' a shadow of its former self.
Once a major Navy training base, it is now a bare-bones U.S. beachhead cut off from the rest of Cuba by barbed wire, guard towers and minefields.
For Aleman-Garces and Alonso-Garanados, the refugee camp is not a pleasant memory.
Five years ago, Cuba's economy was plunged into crisis by the fall of the Soviet Union, long a vital source of the island nation's trade and aid.
Aleman-Garces, 29, worked as a customs officer in Havana. Alonso-Garanados, 26, was a nurse. The two, who are not married, have been together since 1991.
As Soviet trade and subsidies dried up, so did their purchasing power. Food and other necessities became unaffordable or unavailable.
In today's Cuba, ``if you don't work, you don't eat,'' Alonso-Garanados said through an interpreter. ``But if you work, you still don't eat.''
So they decided to get out, leaving behind their families - parents, brothers, sisters, Aleman-Garces' 7-year-old daughter - and the only home they'd ever known.
``Leaving my family was hard,'' Alonso-Garanados said. ``But I would leave and die in the sea before I would stay in Cuba. There was no opportunity of any kind.''
The two set out with 31 other people on a crowded homemade raft made of plywood, Styrofoam and an upside-down car top. After a day at sea, they were picked up by the U.S. Coast Guard 25 miles from Cuba and taken to Guantanamo.
At their peak of operation in the fall of 1994, the tent camps there bulged with 46,000 Cuban and Haitian migrants. Life there was ``very, very difficult,'' Aleman-Garces said. ``I don't like to remember it.''
At one point, they were crammed into a tent with 28 other people. They ate MREs - the ``meals ready to eat'' prepared for U.S. soldiers in combat. Water, piped in through above-ground pipes in the tropical heat, arrived so hot that the migrants let it cool in pails before trying to drink it.
``It was monotonous,'' Aleman-Garces said. ``There were soldiers watching us all the time.''
``I couldn't breathe there,'' said Alonso-Garanados.
To pass the time, many of the Cuban balseros - Spanish for ``rafters'' - created works of art with whatever materials they could find. Paintings, wood sculptures and model ships were popular.
Aleman-Garces estimates he made 20 to 25 model ships, some in bottles. One of them sits on a bookcase in the apartment, an intricately detailed sailing vessel made of wood, broom straw, mosquito netting, pencils, Q-tips and tongue depressors.
Days and weeks turned into months. After a year at Guantanamo, ``I was desperate to get out,'' Alonso-Garanados said.
For decades during the Cold War, people who left Castro's Cuba were welcomed into the United States, no questions asked. But under a new policy announced last year by the Clinton administration, Cubans are treated like any other immigrants. The policy allows up to 20,000 to enter the United States each year.
One requirement is that they have a sponsor in this country. Aleman-Garces and Alonso-Garanados had no relatives here to fill that role, so Edgardo Abreu-Arocho came to their aid.
The Virginia Beach resident is a Navy master chief petty officer now assigned to the amphibious transport dock Trenton. A native of Puerto Rico, he's been in the Navy 28 years, including three years at Guantanamo.
A Cuban friend who works at the base exchange told him about Aleman-Garces and Alonso-Garanados. She had met them at a Baptist church on the base that was providing services for the refugees.
Abreu-Arocho spent a month getting to know them. ``The way they came across to me, they had a future,'' he said. ``They came across alive. They were willing to sacrifice to improve, and I believed them.'' He agreed to be their sponsor.
Four months ago, the two were resettled in Portsmouth through Refugee and Immigration Services of the Catholic Diocese of Richmond, which has brought about 150 of the Guantanamo balseros to Hampton Roads.
The agency helps the Cubans find jobs and arranges for English lessons and other services.
``Our job is to help them become self-sufficient as soon as possible,'' said Jane Cook, the agency's acting director. ``Some of them are doing very well, some are struggling, and some are not doing very well at all.
``The culture shock is very severe,'' she said. ``They haven't had much orientation. They come in with a lot of fantasies about the streets being paved with gold.''
Aleman-Garces and Alonso-Garanados are one of the agency's success stories. Within a month, they had both found jobs. Aleman-Garces loads trucks at a factory in Suffolk that makes plastic containers. Alonso-Garanados works at a laundry in Portsmouth that specializes in hospital linens.
It is a modest beginning, but they knew they would have to start at the bottom.
``I know finding a nice job is difficult,'' Aleman-Garces said.
``I expected everything was going to be hard at first, because I had a lot to learn,'' Alonso-Garanados said. ``I didn't know the language. I also knew my nursing diploma wasn't going to be worth anything here - that I would have to start over.''
They also have had to cope with facets of American life that were foreign to them - income taxes, for example. There is no such thing in Cuba. It was a shock to see how little money was left in their paychecks after taxes had been withheld.
And now they must budget for medical expenses. Health care is free in Cuba.
Nevertheless, they have already saved enough money to send some to their families.
Abreu-Arocho is optimistic about the couple's prospects.
``I told them if you want to come up, you have to work,'' he said. ``You have to start from the bottom and work your way up, and you cannot look back. And I think that's what they're doing.
``All they needed was a little push. That's all I did. And now they're on their own. It's amazing.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
BETH BERGMAN/The Virginian-Pilot
Antonio Aleman-Garces and Teresa Mercedes Alonso-Garanados say
they're embarking on an exhilarating new life of limitless
opportunity. For Aleman-Garces and Alonso-Garanados, the refugee
camp at ``Gitmo'' is not a pleasant memory.
Graphics
Photo
ASSOCIATED PRESS
REFUGEE CAMP TIMELINE
GUANTANAMO'S SHRINKING ROLE
[For complete graphics, please see microfilm]
KEYWORDS: MILITARY BASES CUBA BASE CLOSINGS by CNB