A young Cuban named Raidel Ramírez shared on Sunday a touching video of his farewell to Cuba before emigrating abroad in 2023, a clip that garnered over 173,000 views in just a few days and moved thousands of users.
The images show the young man wrapping himself in hugs and tears alongside friends from the neighborhood and family members, in what he described as one of the toughest moments of his life.
In the background of the video, a turquoise classic car appears, a distinctive image of Cuban neighborhoods, while one of the people present is visibly crying during the farewell embrace.
Raidel published the clip in response to another user on the platform and tagged it with the words #cuba, #farewell, #latinos, and #venezuela, suggesting that the South American country was part of his migration route or destination.
The description accompanying the video was short but direct: "Goodbye Cuba, I left Cuba in 2023."
That year marked the peak of the largest migration exodus in Cuban history: between 2022 and 2023, more than one million people left the island, which is equivalent to 10% of its total population, reducing the number of inhabitants from 11.18 million to 10.56 million.
In the fiscal year 2023 alone, around 425,000 Cubans arrived in U.S. territory, a figure that surpassed all previous migration movements from the island, including the Mariel Boatlift of 1980 and the balsero crisis of 1994.
Around 800,000 of those emigrants were between 15 and 59 years old, which severely impacted the country's workforce.
Recorded farewells in neighborhoods, courtyards, and airports have become a recurring phenomenon on TikTok, where the Cuban diaspora finds a space for collective mourning.
Similar videos to Raidel's generate empathy and catharsis among those who recognize their own stories of separation, whether they are those who left or those who stayed behind waiting.
The Cuban migratory grief is characterized by guilt, anxiety, and deep sadness, exacerbated by the uncertainty of when—or if—there will be a reunion.
The economic crisis, the political repression of the regime, and the lack of opportunities are the main drivers of an exodus that, according to demographer Juan Carlos Albizu-Campos, may have reached 1.79 million people between 2021 and 2024.
The video by Raidel, with its 179 comments and hundreds of reactions, is just one of the thousands of testimonies that document this human cost: empty houses, lonely grandparents, and broken families spread across the island and the world.
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