What do you miss the most about Venezuela?

What I miss the most are the flavors. The flavors of my food, the cheese, so many things, and despite meeting wonderful people here, that feeling of the Venezuelan is missed. The customs, the food, the family, the friends.

What is an obstacle you went through and overcame? 

Well, I believe that the obstacle that I overcame once I became a mom, was the abandonment of my mother. My mother abandoned me when I was two years old. And well, when one is small one does not feel that. Thanks to God He always puts little angels in my path and an older lady received me. She was my mom until she died at 94. I was already married and had my daughter. After I had my daughter, I began to ask these questions: Why does a mother abandon her child? So many questions came that I asked before. Why didn’t I have more siblings? Why didn’t I have a family with a dad, mom, and siblings? All of that. Then I understood that God does things and moves things in His own way. He used the lady who gave me life for simply that, just to bring me into the world. Then he gave me my mother, the older woman. She taught me to believe in God above all things and to work and that even if the work being done is insignificant to someone else’s eyes, I should do it with love. She taught me to do all things with love. She first taught me the love of God and then the value of work. Also, she taught me that if I was going to make a family, that my family was the priority, and that has been the main thing for me from the moment in Venezuela when we began to go through so many problems. My family was always my priority.

My husband had been in the United States for a year and a half and I couldn’t be alone with just my daughter, I had to be with my family. It was a whole process and a miracle from God to come to the United States. Leaving Venezuela was a miracle from God. They closed the Embassy of the United States to Venezuela. So, where would I get a visa? I thought about going to another country. Maybe we could go to Chile or Columbia, but what about my husband? No, I couldn’t do that, so I asked God, “ My God, you have to give me a miracle. If it is in your plans that I go to the United States, open the doors for me.” The Embassy then opened. Everyone told me that they were not going to give me a Visa, but I am a woman that will do everything she sets her mind to. Well, when I went, my visa was granted. 

When my daughter and I arrived at the airport, they didn’t let me fly with my daughter. They told me that I needed a travel permit from my husband. I showed the letter that my husband had given me and they did not want to accept it. Again I prayed, “My God, take that person away from me, please.” I knelt on the airport floor, I remember, and Evelin (daughter) would tell me, “Mom, don’t cry. Mommy, we have to get out of here. We will get out of here.” I could not go back to Barquisimeto. We had to go to Valencia to be able to leave and returning to Barquisimeto implied that I had no money, I had nothing, what was I going to do? I said, “No God, please let a miracle happen.” We went back to immigration and the girl who had rejected my papers previously was still there. As I approached her again, I was praying.  At that moment, the woman’s phone rang and left and another person took her spot. The new person allowed me to proceed onto the plane. Later, they unloaded all my suitcases because they saw something suspicious there. They were my daughter’s bowling balls. And when the guard opened the suitcase, the other guard said, “I told you, it’s bowling balls.” 

Leaving Venezuela brought us a lot of tears until we could not cry anymore. When I got here to Miami, the only thing the guard said to me was, “Welcome to the United States.” When we got to Detroit and I saw my husband I said, “We made it.”