Ten years after my mother’s passing I discovered love letters from her first boyfriend. The letters span from 1979 to 1980, at the onset of the Salvadoran Civil War. While my mother, Patricia Cruz, migrated from El Salvador to the United States, her boyfriend, Sigfrido Reyes, was funded by the forming leftist party to study in the Soviet Union. The story of their lost love examines displacement, and how Cold War Era politics played out within Latin America.
This is a personal story of unforgetting for a first-generation person in the USA. It explores the complexities of memory and attempts to help re-contextualize: our understanding as first-gen people, immigration policies and contemporary global relations.
lo que hubiera sido
Paty + Frido