Ada's Story
Ada Diaz was 11, in the fall of 1961, when she was sent to live in America with her younger brother Hector. Their mother didn’t want to send the children away to be taken care of by strangers but their father “the sensible one”, as Ada called him decided it was better for the children to go to America until it was safe for them to return to Cuba. They hoped that day would be soon but were unsure when it would happen.
Ada remembers being at the airport in Havana airport, being interrogated before leaving the country and trying to calm her little brother who didn’t understand why in a matter of days their happy middle-class family was being torn apart. Ada remembers tearfully hugging her father goodbye. He tried to calm her fears and let her know it wouldn’t be for long, but she could tell that he feared they would never see each other again.
Ada and Hector boarded a plane as part of Operation Pedro Pan, ran by the Catholic Welfare Bureau, and from Havana flew to Miami, Fl. Once in Florida they were told they would be going to Colorado, their first question was “Does it snow there?” when told that yes it snowed in CO they were excited for their new adventure.
Once they arrived at Scared Heart orphanage it wasn’t the adventure they had thought it would be. The nuns had their hands full with nearly 50 new kids that all spoke Spanish, a language the nuns did not speak. To deal with the kids there was a lot of yelling, punishment, and keeping the kids busy working in their free time. Many of these children came from upper middle-class homes where they had nannies and house keepers, so they rebelled which just made the nuns become more aggravated.
Ada came to accept this life in an orphanage and at the age of 15 she was placed in a foster home. Sadly, she didn’t stay long in the first foster home since the social worker thought she was too protective of Hector, so they sent her to a different home in a different city. The next foster home was extremely difficult for her and the social worker called Ada “unadaptable” This left her homeless. But even finding herself homeless she found a job and a place to live and finished high school.
Even though Ada was thrown all these curve balls she was able to overcome and live a successful life. After graduating high school, she went one to earn her BA in Business Administrations and had a successful career in the telecommunication field.
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