A Cuban content creator living in Spain broke down in tears in front of her followers as she read aloud a letter her mother sent her from Cuba, a message so intimate and universal that it touched a wound shared silently by millions of Cuban families.
Dei Flaki Flow, who has been living outside of Cuba for three years, posted the video on June 4 with the description "It has been 3 years since I left Cuba" and dedicated it to "all the Cuban mothers who are not with their children."
The letter begins with an image that summarizes everything: "My dear daughter, today I woke up looking at your photo, the very one I keep alongside the Virgin and the most precious things in my life. I cleaned it with the tip of my apron as if I could also wipe away the distance that separates us."
The mother describes a house transformed by absence: "The house doesn't sound the same since you left. Your room still has something of you. Sometimes I go in just to feel that you're still there."
One of the most powerful passages in the text dismantles the most widespread narrative about Cuban emigration: "Many believe that children leave in search of a better life for themselves. I know the truth: you left thinking of us. You left so that there would be food on the table, so that the family could move forward."
The mother also recognizes the burden her daughter carried alone: "I saw you leave with a suitcase full of dreams and a heart weighed down by responsibilities that should never have rested so heavily on such young shoulders."
And instead of calling her an immigrant, he calls her brave: "Although the world sees you as an immigrant, I see you as a brave one."
The passage that moved those who watched the video the most was the one freeing the daughter from all debt: “You owe me nothing, daughter. Not a dollar. Not a package. Not a top-up. No more sacrifices.”
Dei Flaki Flow couldn't finish reading without crying. "It's impossible," he repeated several times in front of the camera, as his followers flooded the comments with their own separation stories.
The letter closes with a certainty that many Cuban mothers will recognize as their own: "Remember that in this small house in Cuba, there is a mother who prays for you every night. Because children may emigrate, but for a mother, they never truly leave. With all my heart, mom."
The video is produced in the context of the largest migratory exodus in post-revolutionary Cuban history: between 2021 and 2025, over a million Cubans left the island driven by the economic crisis, chronic blackouts, shortages, and political repression.
It is estimated that 38% of Cuban families have at least one member living abroad, and separations typically last between two and four years, with documented cases of up to six years.
This collective pain has found a space for catharsis on social media. This week, a Cuban mother reunited with her children in Serbia after four years of separation, another video that touched thousands in recent days.
In closing his video, Dei Flaki Flow summarized in one sentence what his mother's letter had conveyed in full pages: "Distance separates bodies, but never the love between a mother and a daughter."
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