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A video posted on TikTok showing Cubans bathing in the rain has sparked a wave of nostalgia among the diaspora, with hundreds of heartfelt comments from emigrants who recognize that custom as a richness that can only be appreciated from a distance.
The post, shared on the account @candysantos_01 last Wednesday, features the introductory message "It's not about understanding life, but about living it," and in just a few days, it has garnered over 29,000 views, 1,170 likes, and 149 comments.
Among the most shared reactions, one stands out that captures the collective sentiment of an entire generation: "We were millionaires and we didn't know it; we miss that Cuba, everything was so different."
Other users joined in with equal intensity. "Wow, it's been years since I did that," wrote one. Another left a longer message: "How much I miss doing that; I don't remember the last time I was caught in a downpour in Cuba. May God allow me to return and experience again those moments when I was happy."
The custom of bathing in the rain is deeply rooted in Cuban culture, linked to childhood, neighborhood life, and the spontaneity of everyday life on the island.
From exile, these simple practices take on enormous symbolic value: they represent an era perceived as more free and communal, regardless of the material hardships that defined it.
The phenomenon is not isolated. The resident of Camagüey, @elnegro.com87, posted a video on TikTok on June 2 showing his children bathing in the rain in Florida, with a statement that resonated with thousands: "When I tell people that I live in the United States as if I were living in Cuba, I literally bathe in the downpour with my children."
That video surpassed 53,000 views and nearly 200 comments, with reactions that blend admiration, humor, and cultural identification.
Southern Florida, with its tropical climate similar to that of Cuba—frequent summer rains, heat, and humidity—makes it easy for many émigrés to recreate these experiences physically and keep the emotional connection with the island alive.
TikTok has become the main platform for this cultural expression, with thousands of videos documenting Cuban customs preserved abroad, emotional family reunions and reflections on migrant identity.
This digital nostalgia also finds its most significant in-person expression at Cuba Nostalgia 2026, held at the Miami-Dade County Fair & Exposition, which brought together more than 25,000 people to celebrate Cuban traditions, gastronomy, and cultural memory, connecting older emigrants with young Cuban-Americans born outside the island.
The phrase "we were millionaires and didn’t know it" encapsulates a reinterpretation often echoed in the diaspora: wealth was not economic but experiential, and is only fully appreciated when it is no longer within reach.
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