A Cuban known on TikTok as Yali (@yalinita10) posted a video that touched thousands on Saturday, June 13: her return to Cuba after four years and two months of being apart from her family.
In the four-minute and twenty-second clip, you can hear the exact moment of the reunion, with shouts of "Mommy! Hallelujah!" that capture the intensity of that much-anticipated moment.
In the description of the post, Yali acknowledged that she always cried when watching these kinds of videos and wondered when her turn would come: "I don't know where to start, it's a feeling that can't be explained. Whenever I watched this type of video, it was inevitable to cry and feel so much emotion, thinking about when it would be our turn."
The young woman also emphasized what that return means for those who have emigrated: "Only people like us who have emigrated know what it means to come back home, to see your parents who are your driving force, your family, your friends in general, so many emotions that I cannot explain."
Yali attributed the reunion to her own effort and faith: "I still can't believe that I saw my homeland again; I embraced what I had longed for over four years and two months, all thanks to God and to us for not giving up and working hard."
The video gathered over 6,000 views, 617 likes, and 50 comments, resonating particularly with the Cuban diaspora, who immediately identified with those images.
This reunion is part of a trend that has solidified on TikTok during 2025 and 2026: emigrated Cubans returning to the island and filming the moment they embrace their loved ones again. Some of these videos have reached up to 710,000 views. Among the most memorable cases is that of Pedro Solano, who returned after 20 years and whose mother nearly fainted from emotion at the airport, as well as a Cuban living in Miami who returned after four years and shocked thousands with her family's cries upon seeing her.
The phenomenon reflects the reality of a massive emigration that since 2021 has led over a million Cubans to leave the island, leaving countless families separated for years. Most of those who emigrate are between 25 and 35 years old, and they have settled in the United States, Spain, Brazil, and other countries.
The visits of emigrants to Cuba have decreased by 22.6% in 2025, with 228,091 returns compared to the 294,816 recorded in 2024, according to data from the National Office of Statistics and Information. This decline makes each reunion even rarer and, for that reason, even more celebrated.
"Thank you, God, for this, which was for me the most beautiful and wonderful thing in my life," Yali wrote as she closed her post, with words that thousands in the Cuban diaspora felt as their own.
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