As a little girl growing up in Havana, Cuba, I loved the weekends I spent with my grandparents at their hacienda in Calimete. It was a small farming community so feeding the chickens and collecting eggs was exciting. My Grandmother, Gecheved Aizenberg, cooked extravagant multicultural Jewish-Cuban meals in an unassuming kitchen.

Outside, my grandfather, David Boruchin, would snatch chickens from the backyard coop; breaking their necks with a swift hand motion. He’d then hand them over to my grandmother, who would perform the necessary preparations over a double-sink typical of island farmhouses. The results might be arroz con pollo, sauteed chicken with yellow saffron rice or pollo asado, Cuban-style baked chicken, accompanied by fruit compote, with cinnamon-sugar kichel cookies to follow. Everything sizzled with Jewish-Cuban flair. I will always cherish those memories and try to recapture that joy in my own Jewish Holiday cooking.

When Passover arrived, Flan, caramel custard, was served for dessert. But first was a tasty bistec de palomilla, thin filet mignon with cebollitas (chopped onions). Or even a “Cuban style” brisket, fragrantly cooked for hours with tomatoes, onions, vegetables, bay leaves, and sherry cooking wine. Potato Latkes and kugel would accompany Picadillo, a peasant-inspired meat dish with olives and raisins. Of course, all meals were served with platanos maduros (fried plantains). Yes, we liked food. Very much. The symbolic Seder plate laid neatly in the middle of her simple wood kitchen table.

Born in Poland, my grandmother immigrated to Cuba with her four sisters in the 1920s. They left during a time of many pogroms. Later, most of her family perished in concentration camps. Two of her little brothers escaped through the Russian Forest and arrived safely in Israel. She learned to speak Spanish after arriving in Cuba, but continued conversations in Yiddish with her family. My mother, born in Havana, mostly spoke Yiddish with my grandmother. It was actually my mother’s first language in Havana. While in Cuba, we were all known as Polacos.

During my childhood, the several languages were overpowered by a different form of communication: food. Jewish-style cooking was first and foremost; especially during all the holidays. The Spanish culture and “comida of Cuba” influenced her cooking. Matzo ball soup served with Chicken Fricassee was accompanied by white rice with the black beans.

The Passover Haggadah was in Spanish and English. Traditional Passover dishes were always partnered by something Cuban. The Afikomen was hidden and all the kids benefited from its discovery. The adventure was as lush as the reward.

Our dinner conversations were mainly in Spanish. Discussions regarding Fidel were controversial. After all, my family left Cuba in 1961 amidst the Cuban Missile crisis. Our home, most of our belongings, and our sense of patriotism were all stripped from us. I lived in Havana until I was 8 years old. Fortunately, we Cuban Jews, Jewbans, were a tight-knit group. We lived walking distance to my Jewish Day School and our family was a member of the local Conservative Temple, El Patronato. Our Eastern European heritage blended smoothly with the island’s Spanish essence. I had never heard of “discrimination” or “anti-semitism” in Cuba. Our live-in “nanny,” Agustina, was different than us, but also a part of our family. We actually wanted her to come with us to America but unfortunately, she could not find her Birth Certificate and a passport could not be obtained.

Many of the Eastern European Jews who came to the island were accepted as new “merchants” who set up small shops in Old Havana. These stores sold fabrics, clothing, jewelry, cigars, and shoes. Many Jewish newcomers settled into a very comfortable life on the Island. The climate, the friendly Cuban people, the tropical foods and beautiful beaches surrounding us were to their liking. Can you blame them?

I am Ana

After leaving Cuba, we resettled briefly in Miami Beach. Many Ashkenazi (Eastern European) and Sephardim (Spanish, Middle Eastern) Jews left Havana with hopes of returning after Fidel Castro took power. Unfortunately, after a few months, the dream of returning to our homeland was exactly that − just a dream. Communism took hold the island and businesses and families lost everything. My own family suffered the same fate.

More than 20,000 Eastern European Jews left Cuba around 1961. We arrived on the shores of Miami Beach as political refugees. Most of us did not receive a warm welcome or much assistance from the U.S. Government or Jewish agencies. Somehow, within our own cluster, we formed a circulo of a Cuban Jewish community.

The children went to local public schools and everyone helped everyone. We were always grouped together in these new American schools. I had learned a bit of English at my old Cuban Jewish Day school so I had the blessing/curse of understanding most of what I heard in my new country. But my parents and grandparents struggled to find their way. In time, my mother and grandparents learned English by watching television and listening to radio. However, Spanish was the only language spoken at home.

My Father found work through his previous connections to the U.S. clothing industry. As a business man, he often traveled to the U.S. and, fortunately, he was able to find friends in the industry willing to help. He found work in a manufacturing plant in Columbia, Tennessee. So we moved. Again. We were off to Murfreesboro, Tennessee where we would rent a home with my grandparents.

In Murfreesboro, I entered 4th grade in a school with my brother. We would walk home from school, being mocked and called “political refugees” and told to “go home.” It was a politically-controversial time in the United States as President John F. Kennedy was dealing with Cuban-stationed armed Russian missiles facing the US. I will never forget the feeling of being different and hated for it. My mother would get phone calls to remove my pierced earrings. (In the Cuban tradition, when a little girl is born, the doctor pierces her ears. Yet another example of how Jews assimilated into the Cuban culture.) In Tennessee this was simply not acceptable.

Throughout my schooling, I was tested for English proficiency; something I still wonder about. I was a bilingual-speaker and most of my new American friends only knew one language. Most countries, outside of the United States, require their students to learn more than one language. English was taught in my Jewish Day School in Havana. And so was Hebrew. It was strict, to say the least.

To this day, I look back and wonder how immigrants of today assimilate to their new homes. How they try to “belong” but still carry their existing language, culture, history, and tradition. Many immigrant friends were told to forget their native language. “You are in America now, you must only learn English,” I was often told.

My Parents made us speak Spanish at home, constantly took us to our Cuban Jewish families in Miami, and never stopped reminding us of our roots. The Cuban Jewish community in Miami is still a very tight-knit group. Life there has become a replica of our life in Cuba. Many young ones attend Jewish Day schools, speak both English and Spanish, eat tons of Cuban food, and maintain a strong allegiance to both Jewish and Cuban-American culture. I have family that owns a Cuban restaurant in Miami Beach called Sazon. It’s their way to keep the cultural connection alive and maintain bonds with the family who often pop in there for a cafecito or a warm Cuban meal.Many others have rebuilt their businesses or successfully pursued new professions. They stay involved politically and are very devoted to Israel. Some of the Orthodox Cuban Jewish groups have become even more conservative over the years.

We were always taught to remember where we came from and to embrace our Cuban-Jewish origins.

My journey, now many years in the making, will forever be beautiful and important to me. I only hope my family and others appreciate and treasure being “different.” And that they never allow their differences to be wrongly ridiculed rather than rightly valued.

May we all remember our roots and let them be the true reason why we grow.

− Anita Adams, forever a Jewban