‘The Boy Who Said
No’ by Patti Sheehy
Published by
Oceanview Publishing 2013
A personal family
history can be either mundane or fascinating and that of Frank Mederos
certainly falls into the latter category.
Related to the author over a period of about a year, Frank told of his
birth and upbringing in a suburb of Havana, Cuba, during the overthrow of Batista’s government by Fidel Castro and how he
and his family suffered by finding themselves on the wrong side of the
divide.
Loved and educated in the culture of the old Cuba, thanks
mainly to the attention and wisdom of his grandfather, Frank found himself
transported at the age of 13 to an unknown destination in the mountains with
the instruction to teach a family to read.
This was all part of Castro’s plan to eliminate illiteracy; the schools
were closed and children were dispatched to the remotest parts of the
countryside to educate Cuba’s poor citizens.
The Haitian family were unwelcoming to Frank who realised he would have
to prove himself before they would accept him.
Giving away his blanket to one of the children was a start and learning
to fend for himself in this alien environment was essential. Working from dawn to dusk, he had to make his
own shoes out of rubber tyres and pick a range of vegetables as well as sort
coffee beans. Trying to teach the
family to read came after work to the light of a candle and as the days dragged
on he missed his family more and more.
Returning to Havana after ten months, the ‘alfabetizadores’
were welcomed home with a great celebration at supposedly having achieved their
goal; whilst the children in Frank’s family had benefited, the parents were
still unable to read and write.
Forty-two ‘Martyrs of the Revolution’ had died in the campaign.
In the meantime, America had failed to subdue Castro in the
Bay of Pigs and it was now considered necessary to train more soldiers in the
art of warfare with weapons supplied by Russia.
Frank’s reward for his success in the literacy programme was to be sent
away, the day after his return, to a government-run scholarship school where he
would be indoctrinated with revolutionary zeal and military prowess. He was devastated to be parted from his
family once again, but whilst achieving the latter during his time there, he
resisted the former.
Many Cubans were unhappy with Castro’s regime and left for
America after either obtaining visas or risking dying at sea in fragile
boats. The family of a girl who had
become very close to Frank applied for visas and Frank looked for ways of
escaping by sea. It was a long and
frightening time, trusting unknown men and hiding in the homes of loved ones
who risked their lives to help him, but Frank survived the sea journey and
eventually began a new life in America with his girlfriend.
A good read which describes the personal journey of a
dissident and his determination to escape a revolutionary political regime with
which he could not agree.
