Personal Narrative: My Journey To America

Let me start off with my mother's journey to America. It was 1985 when her parents decided it was time for a fresh start. It was very difficult to come to America legally, so they made their journey by traveling to other countries. They left Cuba and traveled to Spain where my grandfather found a job as a farmer. They lived in Spain for almost 2 years before they gathered enough resources to travel to Mexico. The journey from Mexico to the USA was very easy for them because they had a family member who knew their way around. They struggled for many years in America but soon became legal citizens. My mother later on went to college and completed her bachelor's degree in accounting from the University of Miami. My grandparents purchased the
home and have been living there for many years.

My father's story was a lot more difficult but everything turned out for the best he arrived to America about a year after my mother did. My father traveled with his father and two of his brothers. They had to leave behind his mother and his three younger brothers because of the size of the raft, their resources, and the danger that it involved. It was very difficult for them to leave them behind but they would not be able to travel together.
My grandfather and his older children including my father spent almost a year gathering supplies and building a raft for their Travel. When they completed their raft they gathered few belongings and a week’s supply of food and traveled through the ocean. The first day was the easiest because they had very high hopes and their dream of America was coming true. They didn’t even notice the heat nor the choppy water; to them it seemed like the last bump on the road to a better life. The second day passed just as fast as the first day, but the third day was very different. The third day of their, at best, 5 day journey they woke up and realize that their food, which was on a smaller raft tied to the back of the main raft, was no longer there. To this day they do not know how it happened, they just assume that the waves forced the knot loose and the food drifted away. This was around the time that they started to become fearful for what might happen. The fourth day was when they began to feel intense hunger and fear. On the fifth day they realized that their trip wouldn’t come to an end soon. They realized that the current had slowed them down by at least two more days. At this point, hungry and hopeless,
they were praying for a miracle. On the 6th day with their hopes as low as they can be, near death, my father notices a boat in the distance and as luck would have it the boat noticed them too. The boat came up next to their small raft and pulled them on board. They gave my dad, grandfather and uncles’ food and water and took them to shore. Their prayers had been answered. When they arrived their family that was waiting for them in America was not there. They were later able to find them and they found out that everyone thought they were dead. After that they worked hard to make enough money to live and saved the extra to be able to bring the rest of their family to America. After 3 years they were able to bring their mother and other siblings to America to join them in West Palm beach, FL.
Once my dad’s family was all here and they were getting by, my father met my mother. They met when he accompanied his parents to the home of their old friends, my mother’s parents. After rejecting my father enough times my mother finally decided to date him and eventually married him, moved to a house in Hialeah and had my sisters and I.