Tag: Written

On my first visit to Miami, my host told me it’s a good place to write. I’m glad I listened and moved here. That trip included a stop at the Freedom Tower. I recognized its architecture from a trip to Spain, where I climbed to the top of the Giralda Tower, the inspiration for Miami’s landmark, and looked out over Seville to the ocean.

There’s another tower on the corner of Northeast 6th Street and Biscayne Boulevard, “The Tower of Snow,” a bronze of a young boy on crutches carrying the weight of his home on his back, erected to commemorate Operation Pedro Pan and the child refugees brought to the United States during the mass exodus at the start of the Communist revolution in Cuba. It symbolizes an immigrant’s feelings of duality, fragility and exile—feelings I relate to, having grown up a military brat, in a different kind of diaspora. I’m at home in Miami, where hardly anyone seems to be from here. For the most part, Miami has welcomed me.

Most people associate the Freedom Tower with refuge and welcome and the many Cubans who were processed there when the federal government repurposed the building as an entry point to democracy.

I now work in the Freedom Tower for the Miami Book Fair, where I write the newsletter. I’m greeted at the elevator by a stone carving of a printing press from 1925, when the building headquartered the Miami News. Periodically, the newsletter runs a column called “Freedom Tower Dispatches.” Recently, I found myself exploring the view from above:  

Freedom Tower Dispatch: September 1, 7:23 p.m., 91°F, (RealFeel 102°F): Out of Many, One

2:39 p.m.: Through an east-facing window of the Freedom Tower, my co-worker Gervacio sees a man face-down across the street. Ads for shows and liquor cycle blindly on the giant LED screen attached to the American Airlines Arena. We are seven floors above him, four lanes of city traffic away, watching from our air-conditioned office, while people pass by. He’s not moving; we’re concerned he might be dead. No one stops.

Nothing is as hot as lying face down on the pavement at 2:39 p.m. on the 1st of September in Miami.

Something is wrong.  

Gervacio, our student assistant Yoshi, and I, grab water and cellphones, and head down and across. He’s alive, but his breathing is shallow, his eyes are wide open, glazed, and unfocused. He’s unresponsive to four different languages.

As I write this, hours later, the air is cooled by thunderheads and the setting sun. While the three of us stood over the man, it felt as though we’d been trapped in a broiling oven along with a pot of evaporating water.

We called 911.

Before I moved to Miami, I worked with people with seizure disorders. I have a visceral reaction when I’m close to people in seizures. This man was having an absence seizure, which doesn’t manifest with convulsion. He didn’t need to be repositioned. His airway was clear. I’ve seen people in convulsive seizures, and feel the same distance, an electric aura, something kinetic thrown from the body, the outwardly spiraling moan of a brain with circuitry gone haywire.

It took us about four minutes to get from the 7th floor to where the man lay prone on the sidewalk and in that time, no one assisted him. Once we began to examine him closely, he became an item of interest, and a small crowd gathered. Someone looked at the man’s watch to check the brand to determine if he had financial status. I’m not sure why, but my thoughts wandered to what Lorca wrote about the death of a matador, something about arsenic bells and smoke. In that instant, I felt a great loss.

After a few minutes, an ambulance arrived. The man was coming out of his haze. One of the paramedics pulled a bottle of medication from the man’s pocket before they lifted him to the gurney, and said he’d be better in no time.

This reminds me how dangerous it is to be shepherded through the corral of our “urgent” agendas. How much is rendered invisible under the cool shade of our haste? Unless someone steps forward to look closely, it becomes just a paseo as always — nothing to see there — nothing lying fragile and frozen on the sidewalk. In the godawful heat of September 1 at 2:39 p.m. in Miami, it can feel bone-chillingly frigid.

When I asked Gervacio what drew him to the window, he said he liked to look at the ocean. He’d like to sail to the Bahamas in the spring.

It’s such a beautiful view from above. Sometimes, when the office is empty, and I need to clear my head to write, I go to the window and look out over the cruise ships to the white buildings on Miami Beach across the bay, and simply breathe for a minute.

I am thankful I work with such a sharp-eyed man as Gervacio, who can see past the glamourous view of Miami, and notice one drop, spilled from an ocean, in danger of evaporating in the afternoon heat.

The first World Aids Day was held in 1988, but we were hard into the epidemic during my time on Miami’s North Bayshore Drive.

From 1983 through 1987, I lived in an old mansion broken up into five apartments. The wood-burning fireplace in my bedroom, the kitchen large enough for a small restaurant, and my unobstructed bay view recalled the home’s former glory. The apartment on the north side boasted a grand staircase that dead ended in a drywall partition. The 12-foot-wide sleeping porch on the south side had been converted to an efficiency apartment, though its layout gave a lie to that name. The second story had been split the way Solomon would never have done the baby, and only the landlord benefited from that.

The house next door served as Mary’s house in the movie “There’s Something About Mary.”

When we moved in, the neighborhood proved so crime-ridden, we sat on the front stoop during friends’ visits to ensure no one stole their cars.

My house stood on the block’s northeast corner. The Cactus Bar & Grill anchored the block’s southwest corner. The Rough Guide to Florida recognized the Cactus as “one of the liveliest gay bars in the area,” which may explain neighborhood’s well-cruised vibe. Like most places with poor people, desire and desperation hung in the air like the humid edge of a storm. My neighbor in the inefficiency, dressed in soiled, skinny white jeans and black T-shirts, would bring working boys home and then refuse to pay. They would argue on the front stoop. He would say, “Who you gonna tell?” I didn’t like him then and still don’t.

My wife at the time, Brigid O’Hagan, and I were struggling to gain a foothold in Miami. Originally from Buffalo, we’d moved from Coconut Grove to North Bayshore Drive for cheap rent and that bay view, but the house brought other dividends.

On one of our first Sundays in the neighborhood, a white Cadillac stopped at the driveway’s end of Mary’s house. Two men dressed in white exited the front seats. The rear passenger side door opened and a woman, also in white, stepped out and began chanting — a slow rhythmic call — in Spanish or Yoruba, I couldn’t tell. It was answered by a voice from the house next door. Together, the three swayed and sang their way up the driveway, each call answered by a response from the house. The beauty of the moment brought tears to my eyes then as the memory does now.

The apartments directly above and beside ours were occupied by a variety of people who only seemed to exist in that narrow strip of land between Biscayne Boulevard and Biscayne Bay. Les Violins was a supper club on the boulevard modeled after Havana nightspot Tropicana. We’d never gone. One of the performers lived above us for a while — a short blonde woman from New York, with a compact Olympic gymnast’s body. She warmed up for her act by accompanying a recording of “New York, New York” with song and dance. She wore tap shoes and could belt it out with a voice like Ethel Merman. The racket she created with those shoes and that voice, while not the best thing in a neighbor, was certainly not the worst.

I can’t remember if she was upstairs before or after the ninjas. The ninjas were a couple, man and woman, who dressed like ninjas. They were a little chunkier than movie ninjas, but they pursued all the same rituals. The first time I saw them land on the front lawn, after leaping from the second-floor porch dressed all in black with only their eyes visible, rolling into crouches, short swords drawn and throwing stars and nunchucks at the ready, it was enough to make me spit my coffee. But after a month or two, their antics became as common as the tide.

Our time in that slice of paradise came to an end when a man attempting to kick heroin came to live with us. The man couldn’t kick it and he brought others into our place to get high. We were no longer beyond the neighborhood’s ills; we had become a part of them. We recognized the need to move on and we did.

That house on Bayshore is gone, replaced by a 47-story condo. The Cactus Bar and Grill exists only as a distant memory. But I imagine the spirits of those boys who tricked in that neighborhood hanging in the shadows of the new building, still waiting — hoping to get paid.

I was born in Detroit, Michigan, and grew up there. I always wanted to travel and meet a diverse group of people, and working with Carnival has helped me do that. I started in 2007 as part of the entertainment staff, and then assistant cruise director, and now cruise director.

I’m the face and voice of the ship – I host the deck parties, help with the onboard programming schedule, do Zumba class and veteran’s appreciation for those vets on board.

Even before I came on the ship, I always liked working with people. That’s very important for hospitality. I’ve also done theater since I was little, so I’m comfortable talking on stage and in front of big crowds. As entertainment staff, you have to do everything for everyone in the department. As an assistant cruise director, there are more middle management duties. Once I became the cruise director, I had to hone in on the managerial details.

Over time you learn that for different home ports and different clientele, you have to provide different entertainment. If we have bad weather and miss a port, you have to come up with a day-at-sea schedule on the spot. Once you’ve done those things a few times, you know what to do, but it helps to be exposed to those situations so you can handle them better.

We work 70 hours a week, with entertainment and planning and scheduling. There are a lot of staff members from India, Indonesia, and the Philippines. We recruit many Europeans, as well.

As cruise director, I use a microphone because I’m talking all of the time. All of the technical things make us look better, so we have high-definition cameras, huge lights and sound systems, and that’s all important for my job. Our newest ship that just launched has an IMAX theater on board, and larger-than-life TV-game shows. Things have changed for the better – now we are way more family oriented than cruise ships used to be. We have a sky course, sky-ride, and lots of fun games.

In my eight years, I’ve only seen one man go overboard. We’ve had medical situations, and the Coast Guard will come out and provide medical care. We’ve had to divert to different ports of call to get someone to a medical facility.

We were sailing out of Baltimore on the Carnival Pride, and there was a 92-year-old guest with us. We had a lip-sync party and he was given “I’m Too Sexy” to sing. He was loving it and dancing and taking his shirt off, and he got so excited that he dropped to the floor. So we relocated the party to a different area, got the medical team there in two minutes, and got him airlifted off in a helicopter. He ended up being okay, and I sent a DVD of his dance at the party and he loved it.

It’s like a floating city. If everything goes like it should, I wake up at 6:30 a.m., check my emails, host a morning show at 9:30, read dedication letters, and then host the Fun-Ashore, Fun-Aboard presentation. After lunch, I go to leader deck and host a master mixology session, and then go with the kids and do Dr. Seuss at Sea, and then we have bingo or music trivia in the afternoon.

Usually the first sea day is “Elegant Night” where we introduce our staff and have a big show in the theater. The bands are playing, and we do giveaways and comedy. And that’s one day, 6:30 a.m. to 11 p.m.

I really don’t have a day off, not with my job. Some do, like the performers in the show have a day off and the spa people can also, but that’s really it for a full day off. On sea days it’s busier for us than port days, because on port days the guests will disembark the ship and then we’ll welcome them back at the end of the day.

You still should have fun – or look like it – or else you’ll be miserable. There are times to be professional, and there are times to enjoy the crew activities. My job is to be the center of the party so I need to have fun so the guests can, too. There are alcohol limits for us on board so we can be ready to respond at any minute. You can have one or two drinks, but that’s it.

The towel animals are learned from practice. The housekeeping staff will do it and pass it on, and there’s a book that references how to make each of the towel animals. Same thing with the fruit; there are usually two or three staff members on board who do all of the carving for fruit and ice. Those people have special skills and that’s why they were hired.

English is the required and primary language on board. We have a crew training center and ESL classes for our crew members to help new crew members improve their English. It’s funny that everyone teaches you the bad words in their languages first!

I love traveling and meeting people all over the world. I like helping my entertainment staff grow and become better. I’ve seen many places, and I’m able to save a lot of money because I don’t have many expenses.

I’ve done the whole Caribbean, Europe (three times), South America, the Baltic and the Mediterranean. I just came from Australia, and I’ll be going to Alaska soon. I collect a magnet from each place I visit.

I really like helping other people. Although I never became a social worker like I wanted to when I was in college, I realized that I’m helping the guests and the people I work with have a fun time, and that’s what is most important for me.

Our home office is here in Miami, so it’s a huge part of our atmosphere on board. We’re always corresponding with Miami while at sea. Miami is different from the rest of the States because of the Latin population, and the diversity of Miami is important. This is the most popular cruise port for Carnival and having the office here makes me want to live in Miami and stay here longer.

I think Miami is the diversity, the music, the culture, South Beach. It’s an iconic place, and no matter where you travel in the world, people want to visit Miami. These aspects influence the cruise industry and Miami the city and make them special and unique.

Miami has not always had a strong background in my family’s history, but we have begun to make it our home. Our story begins with my father, Bennie Holmes, who was born and raised in Miami but has few stories to tell about the experience. It seems many of his memories have dissolved with time. The few tales he does have are saturated with his youth and speak about immature actions, such as him stealing fruit from his neighbors’ mango trees.

However, one story does manage to stand out from the other mischievous ones, offering me a glimpse into the historical Miami race riots in 1980. He starkly remembers sitting on the bus as he and his fellow classmates watched demonstrations in the streets and acts of violence. Then, soon after his graduation from Miami Southridge high school, my father entered the military and met my mother, Roxanne Morton.

My mother is originally from Gary, Indiana, and was already the mother to my sister, Rhea Berry, who was 2 at the time. In a progressive switch of gender roles, my mother asked my father to marry her, and they quickly moved in together in Miami. My family, as it was budding with only three members, alternated between living in Miami and Indianapolis during this time period. My sister would often be sent to live with relatives in Indiana as my mother and father both strove to create a better home environment for her. When my brother was born he was also sent to live in Indiana with my sister, as making ends meet in Miami was becoming gradually more difficult.

Eventually, just a year and a half after my brother was born, I came along. After asking for many details over the years, I can give the details of my birth quite descriptively. It was a Monday in Miami, Florida, at Baptist Hospital. I was born on July 16 at 10:42 p.m. I was in Miami for just about three months before my mother flew with me to Indianapolis because she wanted to be closer with all of her kids.

My father stayed behind to work in Miami for a while and sent us money to keep a consistent amount of income. We found an apartment that we could all comfortably reside in. My father was the last to leave Miami and did not return for years. Within these 10 years I spent my childhood in Indiana, growing up in a culture vastly different from the one I would have come to know had my family stayed in Miami.

I have two homes. I owe a lot of who I am to Indiana, but Miami is where I defined who I am as I developed from an adolescent to a young adult. When I was 10 years old my father traveled back to Miami for the first time in 10 years to see his mother. I believe it was during this visit that my father realized how homesick he was, and a few months after he came home from his visit he requested that we move back to Miami.

Of course, the idea was not met with much resistance as everyone was quite keen on the idea of moving to Miami. My brother and I were only kids, and we did not even realize our history in Miami, just that it was a whole lot closer to Disney World than Indianapolis was. My sister, Rhea, had just graduated from Lawrence Central high school and was all for beginning her start in such a famous city.

Not much planning went into the idea of moving; it all happened in such a rush. My father called my grandmother Dorothy to ask if we could stay with her, and when she said yes, it jump started our move. Just a few months later our house was up for rent, our belongings were packed, and we were in a van driving to Miami from Indiana.

I did not realize the impact of our decision to move until the school year started. We had found a place to live on our own, a duplex, and my brother and I were enrolled at Cutler Ridge middle school. The cultural diversity was amazing.

In Indiana I was surrounded by predominantly Caucasian people, but when I moved here there were so many different races and ethnicities that opened my eyes up to the rest of the world around me. Hearing about the different places that these people had come from caused me to honestly take a look at myself and think about where I came from.

I’ve heard many people describe Miami as a “melting pot;” however, one idea that truly resonates with me is the “salad theory,” where, rather than different people coming to Miami to become like each other, various people come to Miami and bring their own unique aspects, and for the most part, everyone still lives in harmony together.

In Miami I have found my home in different ways. I watched my brother blossom and dwell more comfortably in the environment around him. My sister has found more opportunities than she can recount, and I have found an identity that I did not even know I was looking for at such a young age. I found people whom I honestly care about and have watched them grow into adults. My father has made his way back home again as a nurse and seems content with his life at 44. I could not have asked for a better home.

Miami is everyone’s home. Miami is a place with diverse cultures all in one area. Miami is my home and my family’s home. Miami mostly has Hispanics and people from the Caribbean but there’s a mix of everything here in Miami. I’ve lived here all of my life. I was born in Miami at Mercy Hospital, and when I got a bit older my family moved south of Miami.

My family from my mom’s side is from Honduras, while from my dad’s side they’re from Puerto Rico. I grew up in a Hispanic home, so most of the time everyone is speaking Spanish, Cuban coffee is always being made, and always we have rice and beans with chicken or any other type of meats. My family is the typical Hispanic family, but no one was born and raised here expect for my brother and me.

My mom was born in Honduras and raised there until she was 5 years old. Her mom wanted to start a new and better life, so she left Honduras, and when my mom was 5 years old her mom came back for her and took her to Miami. They started their new lives here in Miami. My mom would always say how when she came into this country that it was completely different. She said that coming to Miami wasn’t that hard, except for the language barrier. Most of the people here in Miami speak Spanish and English, so imagine coming from another country and only knowing one language. It was difficult for her to learn English because everyone was speaking Spanish most of the time, but she learned, and she speaks fluently.

My mother always tells me how happy she was about the decision her mother made to move to Miami. It doesn’t matter where you’re from, Miami makes you feel welcomed. For me, growing up was difficult because I was learning both languages at the same time. I had to learn how to speak, read, and write in English and Spanish. By the time I was in the first or second grade I knew both languages fluently. Adapting in Miami isn’t so hard because you can find people from the same culture, which means you feel more comfortable, but you still get a bit homesick.

Miami became my mom’s home and everyone else in my family. As I was growing up a lot of my family started to move to Miami to be closer to the rest of the family. My aunt from my mom’s side used to live in Honduras, but she moved here to Miami. My aunt left her kids in Honduras, but she did the same thing as her sister, and brought her kids into this country later.

By the time I was 9 years old my cousins were living here in Miami. They went through the same thing my mom went through when she came into this country. They had to learn English, which was hard for them, but they did it. Later on, after my cousins learned the language, they wanted to get their citizenship. They had to study everything from writing to reading and then history. After they passed and got their citizenship, my aunt wanted to get her citizenship, and by the end of the year she was also a citizen.

My family got very comfortable with Miami and it had a good effect on them. My family is very happy here where we are part of a bigger family with different backgrounds and cultures. You get welcomed everywhere you go. Everyone is so accepting and diverse, and you can be who you want to be. That’s why people feel so comfortable here in Miami.

This picture is an artifact and represents my family, the Parrilla family. In this photo it is New Year’s and we had a family get-together. The meaning in the picture is that no matter how far we live from each other we are still a family.

My family is a happy, crazy, funny family. They brought their own culture to Miami because there aren’t that many Hondurans down here. The Honduran restaurants, especially, are very limited and rare. My family makes Honduran food and sells it to different types of people who are interested in tasting it. Now, most of the family lives in Miami and the Honduran culture is getting noticeable. The picture represents my family’s happiness and how close we are and how much we love each other, no matter what.

“El Capitan,” a reliable, sturdy rod crafted by experts that has served my father and his father for years now. It has brought in fish, some worthy of taking a picture with, and some that should not even be mentioned. Something my father cherished, and something I now cherish.

Miami, Florida, a city and state that I have come to adore over the years of living here. Aside from the amazing fishing in the Florida Keys, the Hispanic-cultured restaurants, and thrilling theme parks, my parents have brought their own mix of culture to Miami. The Cuban and Colombian culture is nothing new to South Florida, but being able to pass it down to my siblings and me is a blessing from my parents.

Something my dad has invited to my life that I enjoy very much is the sport of fishing. Fishing is indeed a sport, but to my parents and me it is more than that. It is something you do to forget about work, school, or anything that causes stress. I recall being a young boy, somewhere around 3 or 4 years old, when my father brought me to a beach, and with his fishing rod he would patiently wait to hook a fish. Then he would hand me the rod in hopes that I would get hooked on fishing. I did.

My mother was not always a fan of fishing, however. She would get upset at my father for going fishing with her brother until 5 a.m. and leaving her at home with my brother and sister, who were still toddlers. (I was nonexistent then.) But one day my father convinced my mother to go with him. They left my siblings with her sister, and ever since that first night of fishing my father said she became addicted to it – the thrill of feeling the fishing rod throb, the fear of losing a big fish, and the funny jokes and conversations one has on the bridges or boat.

My parents find it strange how out of their three kids I was the only one who showed interest in the outdoors and outdoor hobbies. My father has taught me all kinds of tactics and methods to be an amazing fisherman, even the types of knots to do in order to compensate for weather conditions, type of fishing, and species type.

My father is passing two things down to me to keep not only his legacy but the items’ legacies alive: a yoyo and “El Capitan.” The yoyo is basically a very large ring that is wrapped with fishing line and used as an alternative fishing rod. This yoyo has been used by his father, and his father’s father and so on, making its way from Cuba and Santo Domingo to South Florida.

The second item, “El Capitan,” did not make it from Cuba but from a flea market in the Florida Keys, a little way from Islamorada. It is not about where it was purchased, but the fights I and my ancestors saw that rod and reel go through. From snapper of all kinds to grouper as long as 40-plus inches to even a 500 lb. bull shark 20 miles off Cuba. That bull shark is a man eater that no doubt can easily tip a Cuban raft and feast upon the voyagers. El Capitan has been used on so many bridges that the butt of the rod has worn down into an angle, perfectly aligned with most bridges’ guard rails. And that is only what I have seen.

The yoyo that was mentioned is actually a quite interesting piece. When my grandfather visited from Cuba he chose the yoyo instead of a modern-day fishing rod and reel. Turns out my father was serious when he told me his dad does better with a yoyo than a reel and rod because he caught more fish than my father, mother and I. The yoyo is unique because of the method used to cast out the line. You do a lasso motion, swinging the line, weight, hook and all over your head, while simultaneously tilting the yoyo horizontally, and then release your thumb and hope you get the distance you want. That was the case for me, at least on my first few attempts. The largest fish I witnessed the yoyo catch was a little over 20-inch mutton snapper.

Aside from the outstanding stories that can be shared from these two pieces, the fact that they relate to something that plays a big role in my life, like fishing, allows me to keep my sanity. These two pieces hold a lot of sentimental value to not only my father and my grandfathers, but to me, too.

My mother has made Miami home by cooking her country’s dishes. Something I look forward to every time her parents visit from Colombia is the food. They make sure to bring all kinds of sweets and foods that do not make it out to the United States. The best combination is to go fishing with my family in the Florida Keys while bringing our culture and ethics from Cuba and Colombia at the same time. Making Miami home.

I was born in Montreal, Canada, on June 16, 1969.

My father is English and my mother is Venezuelan, and they ended up in Canada. I lived in Montreal until I was 7 and then we lived in the U.K., Tampa and Colombia until I settled in Miami in 1990.

I came in January of 1990 to stay with my aunt here whom I’ve always been close with. I got a restaurant job a couple of weeks later. When I moved here I made the commitment to pursue music for 10 years.

My aunt lived in the Fontainebleau area, in this big, ugly, apartment complex thingy she had just moved into. There was a utility closet, and that was my room. I had a bedroll, my stereo, turntable, and a guitar, and I sat in there and did my thing for a year.

I found the local record spots. There was one on 97th Avenue, a place called White Rabbit where I got some Frank Zappa records. On Bird Road there’s Yardbird Records. They had blues, jazz, funk, African, Latin, all kinds of stuff. I just kept feeding my taste, and at that point I was all over the map.

I would buy stuff, put it on the turntable, and learn as much as I could. Then, I went to school/hung out at Miami-Dade College to learn and get the information, but I never took a test, never turned in a paper.

I would go, hang, and observe what I could, and certain teachers there I liked. I got some music theory, some classical guitar, and some jazz theory, just to be able to communicate. I could see and understand chords, but I wanted to know bonehead, basic music theory. After that I went off on my own and did what I could. That was my first year in Miami.

Then I met this guy at the T.G.I. Fridays where I worked in the Miami International Mall. This busboy was a Haitian guy named Max Selesteen, and he found out I played guitar, so he wanted to get together and play. I started going over to his place and we got together once a week for a while.

I got really into his playing style, and I found some Haitian records that I started checking out. I already had a conception and familiarity with Haiti from when my family lived there in the 1950s. My mom always told me good things about Haiti, and I was curious about the music.

After playing with him and listening to Haitian and voodoo records, I started thinking, “Is there a music with some combination of guitars and these voodoo drums? “

Then I walked into this venue on South Beach called Stephen Talkhouse. There was a band playing on stage, and they were doing just what I was fantasizing about. They had the voodoo drums, and other instruments, and it was really cool.

I was looking at it, and standing next to some Haitian guys there. And they asked me, “Do you play?” I said yes, and they asked me to play a gig with them two weeks later at the Marlon Hotel. It was totally wild.

Eventually I started my own band in ’93 or ’94 and called it Spam All-Stars. I’ve been working in the Miami music scene ever since. We recorded, toured and eventually got a Latin Grammy nomination. I saved money for the first time in my life, so I was able to put it down on my house here.

Now I make part of my living from playing in the band and I make a little money from being a DJ. We’ve basically kept it pretty steady for almost 10 years. I make about the same amount of money every year, and keep doing what I like to do. The venues come and go. At this point we’ve outlasted every single venue with the exception of Churchill’s.

I had to have a name to DJ. I already had Spam All-Stars, and at that time (late ‘90s and early 2000s) there were a lot of French house DJs in Miami. I was just being goofy and called myself “le spam.”

Miami’s made of many, many sounds, and it always has been. There’s always going to be a million different intersections of things going on at any given time.

To me, I see every band as having its own unique mythology and texture. I think people look at our band scene here in Miami, and it’s fractured. Miami has had for many years a big experimental, outside music scene, and it goes way back. I think it’s almost a reaction to how slick music comes out of Miami.

Disco came from here. Then in 1980s it was the Miami Sound Machine, and these kind of bands that were creating a slick sound. Now the music we’re mostly known for is Pitbull and Rick Ross, and it’s slick.

But if you don’t really dig deep into the Miami scene you would never know that it’s there. It’s always been, since the ‘70s, a dance music town.

We’re in a real tropical environment and we’re in a place that’s very transient, very new – a place that’s not dwelling on the past very much, for good or bad. This creates a certain amount of energy in the people who live here. If I lived in another place, the music that I make would be totally different because you’re feeding off of everything around you when you create.

I think we have a deep genetic pool for creativity here, and we are all bouncing off of each other with this stuff. This goes for all the artists that I’ve worked with – whether in visual arts, choreography or theater. Each person is what makes Miami. I’m happy to be a part of it in some way.

I am Keegan Simms and I was born and raised in Miami. I am proud of who I am, where I come from, and where I am going. When people ask me the famous question, “Where are you from?” I always anticipate the type of reaction that I will get. To answer that question, I respond with the fictitious word “Germaican.” “What?” they ask, “so you are German and Jamaican?” and I just give them a head nod and a smile. Yes, my mix is not very common and it makes me very unique. My mother is German and my father is Jamaican. It will forever throw people for a loop because even though I am biracial, people are under the impression that I am of Hispanic descent, because of my skin tone and other attributes.

For as long as I can remember my dad would always tell me to learn Spanish and put myself out there because it would give me the advantage, and open doors I could only dream of. Miami, being the melting pot it is, allows me to practice my bilingual skills every day.

Neither of my parents were born in Miami, nor do they have any relatives that previously made historical ties to the great city of Miami. So why and how do I consider Miami my home?

My grandparents on my mother’s side were each born in Germany and moved to Iowa, U.S.A., while they were young. My mother was the third oldest of seven children, who were all raised on a farm in a small town in northeast Iowa. My grandfather always took his kids on airplanes rides, which intrigued my mother enough to join the traveling industry and become a flight attendant. Her job and training stationed her in Miami, where she would meet my dad.

My father is a pure-bred Jamaican who spent almost a fourth of his life on the small island in the Caribbean. After finishing up his education, he picked up a job with Royal Caribbean Cruise Line as a photographer. This allowed him to travel the world while he got paid to do what he loved. My dad had the opportunity to walk on American soil, through his job, and he enjoyed it enough to go through the naturalization process and become an American citizen. What city did he choose to settle in? None other than Miami. It was on one of his trips at sea that he met my mother.

The photograph embodies why Miami is my home. Neither of my parents had previous ties to Miami before they met each other and this picture, in a way, signifies how my parents met. My mother is depicted in the third row from the top and second flight attendant from the left. This is her inducted class of United Airlines flight attendants. The picture was taken by the attractive photographer from Jamaica, otherwise known as my father. All aspects of this picture tell a story about how Miami is my home today. Each of their individual passions led them to meet in one of the most diverse cities in the world.

It was not too long before the wedding, and my parents got married. My mother’s job required her to relocate every so often; before any of my siblings were born, my parents lived everywhere from New Jersey to Hawaii. When my mother was pregnant with my oldest brother, she wanted to settle down in their old stomping grounds and where it all started – Miami, Florida. They bought an abandoned house destroyed by Hurricane Andrew and solely by their hands and the hands of relatives they built the house I live in today. This house we live in is a product of the many generations of hands putting up drywall and perfecting piping systems.

Our family tree is rich in culture as my parents are from different parts of the world. One might think that our household is bursting with different languages and principles, but it is completely the opposite. From stories told to me by my parents, I know that the way my siblings and I were raised was drastically different from the way my parents were raised. I think American society had a strong influence on the way that we were raised. Now, as I evaluate our culture, I realize that we are blazing a new way of life as we take snippets of everyone’s culture and make it our own. Seldom do we do things exclusive to the Jamaican culture or the German heritage. The best way to describe our culture is just a spoon of the “Miami Melting Pot,” with a tad bit more jerk seasoning.

These stories and memories make Miami home. There is no other place I would rather spend my life. Miami is special to me and to the rest of my family. Maybe all it takes for one to call someplace home is just time spent there, but it is the untold stories of the city and the memories that you make while in that city that truly determines your roots.

I was born in Jackson Memorial Hospital, which was founded by my great-grandfather, Dr. James M. Jackson. When my mother was delivering me, according to my grandfather, they did not have enough anesthesia machines. My grandfather, who was working at Jackson at the time, went and rounded one up so that she would have less pain during the delivery.

I was raised in Grove Park, which was bounded by 17th Avenue. I grew up on the river. I used to play in the river and go down there and look at the different animals. You could see manatees and the river crabs.

I had a friend who had a boat and we would go up and down the river and look at the different sites. There used to be land there that was private and, as teenage boys, we would sneak in and explore the secret caves that were next to a small canal. I think once we had to depart rather quickly when a caretaker appeared with a shot gun.

I went to school for elementary and junior high at Citrus Grove, and then high school at Miami High.

I grew up in the 1950s when Miami was still a resort town. It was open in the winter months and many of the hotels on Miami Beach would close down in the summer. My grandmother would rent a cabana at one of the hotels on the beach and we would go and use that in the summer.

The air conditioning was not used extensively in the mid-1950s. I remember visiting people’s houses and the purr of the fans. I would eat dinner at my grandmother’s house and she had a big fan in the dining room that would keep you cool while you were eating.

It wasn’t really until the late ‘50s and early ‘60s that air conditioning became more prevalent. The town was not as large as it is now. I remember camping as a Boy Scout at the youth center, which was in Kendall. It was all fields and sand. We’d pitch tents there and have Boy Scout jamborees.

My Boy Scout troop, troop 66, would meet at Riverside Methodist Church and we would go camping in the Everglades. We would camp in cow fields that were in what is now known as Doral. It wasn’t very long ago that it was all cow fields and lakes out there.

We would also camp on some islands in the bay, and one of them is known as Fisher Island today. It used to have the quarantine station on it, and that was all. It was an island covered with Australian pines. I also used to go sailing on the bay and enjoyed many days sailing around and exploring Biscayne Bay and the Coconut Grove area.

We would go to South Beach, especially in high school. There was a summer culture where all the students would go play on the beach, swim, play football in the ocean, get tans, climb on the jetty, and things I think that kids still do today.

It was a wonderful place to go. There were students there from all over the county.

I went to college my first year at Duke University and I was not a good student. I ended up coming back to Dade Junior College. It’s a very common story actually. There is an adage that everybody returns to Dade. I saw friends who came back after having gone to Harvard.

While I was at the junior college, I noticed this very beautiful freshmen student in my humanities class. I made friends with her and later on we got married in Georgia at a courthouse when I was in medical school. It was a $13 wedding — $3 for a blood test, $10 for a license, and then our friends took us to Arby’s. I’ve been a very spoiled Anglo husband all of these years since.

I went to school and worked in North Carolina for a while. What I did not miss from Miami was the intense heat in the summer. But, despite the beauty of the Blue Ridge Mountains, I did return to Miami 27 years ago to work at the University of Miami and have been here ever since.

I was anointed by my grandmother to become a physician when I was a small boy. She had many grandchildren, but I was the one that she gave the mortar and pestle to that belonged to Dr. Jackson and sat in his office. I still have it to this day.

I became a physician because I wanted to be a surgeon and help people recover from serious injuries. I knew I was going to go into orthopedics as my goal when I went to medical school. I was able to do that, and I’ve had a very successful career in helping people with significant injuries recover and be able to return to a functional and, hopefully, happy life.

I spend a lot of time at the hospital, so my time off and my weekends are spent working in the garden and going for walks. I have a woodshop that I built into my house and I made most of the furniture in my house. I’ll make it out of beautiful mahogany wood and some of the wood I get is actually from trees that have fallen here in Dade County.

It turns out that I’ve always been making things since I was a kid. Those skills of being able to use tools and look at objects in a three-dimensional sense are skills that I carried over to becoming an orthopedic surgeon.

I was aware of the family’s history and I knew as a boy that my great-grandfather was a very special individual and that Jackson Hospital was an extension of the way he lived his life.
He was a revered figure in the household. The painting of James Jackson that is in the Alamo, the original hospital building, was over my mother’s piano for many years before my father donated it for safekeeping.

Dr. Jackson was a man who was very community minded. He came here and became a part of many social groups and was thought of highly among those social groups. He was the president of the YMCA and he helped with the Boy Scouts. He was remarkable in his constant dedication to his community. It was always wonderful having a relative who had done so much good.

I think the 100-year anniversary of Jackson Memorial Hospital is a celebration of something truly special. We get to have this amazing hospital system that is a safety net for our community. It’s something that’s very precious that a lot of big cities don’t have.

I moved to Miami in 2011 in search of “The American Dream,” and to build a better future for myself. In my suitcase, I brought some clothes, family photos, personal documents and a few art books. Being an immigrant is anything but simple; at first, friends gave me lodging while I found a place to live and I spent part of my savings on hiring an immigration paralegal and buying a small car to get around. I looked for a job, but I couldn’t speak a single word of English. I discovered very quickly it was a problem, so I enrolled in free English classes at Coral Gables Senior High School.

After a few months, I looked for the most economical accommodations I could find, a small room in between Little River and Little Haiti. This “efficiency” was depressing because it was dirty, small, and the area was a bit dangerous. It was rough living in such a small place with dirt floors for the entrance, and in between stray chickens, cats and dogs. After paying the required three months’ rent and buying a few necessities at the Little River’s Family Dollar store, I had $25 left in my wallet.

I’ll never forget when I went to my first formal job interview, at the 111 building in Brickell. To all the questions they asked me, I replied using the only word I knew by then which was “Yes,” and I filled out the applications using my cell phone to translate. As I left the building to get my car in the parking lot, the attendant in the parking lot said to me: “Mijo, it is $25.” Then with tears in my eyes, I replied (in Spanish): “It cannot be possible, please check my ticket, it was only an hour or less.” But the attendant made it clear to me that it was a flat fee of $25. So I gave her the last $25 I had in my possession.

I returned to my efficiency with my head down, watching the animal tracks through the sand corridor, and I found pieces of old wood, paint, used brushes, and the remains of curtains; that is when I told myself that the art would save me! I borrowed some tools from the landlord, and I started putting together my canvases. Once the art pieces were ready, I put them in my car, and I went to homes and workplaces of every person I knew to offer my artwork for sale. I sold them all.

I remember when there was no Wynwood design district or Micro-Theater, but I made my way into the visual arts by having my first exhibition in the Coral Gables High School library, then in restaurants and art-walks in Brickell. Those were my beginnings. I am proud to be part of the cultural growth of this city, where I have already exhibited in galleries in Wynwood, such as the Curator Art Project and Spectrum Art Fair.

Alongside my artwork, I needed a full-time job where I could practice my English, because as we all know in Miami, a lot of people speak Spanish. At that time, one of the persons who bought an art piece offered me an opportunity to work as a server at the Vizcaya Museum. When I went and saw the majesty of that building, I fell in love with Miami.

Being a server wasn’t my ultimate goal, but that I knew that it was the way many immigrants start their journey when they move here, and I wanted to be the best of the team. Then, fate played its part; when I was accompanying a coworker to deliver an art piece, I met Gio Alma, the photographer of the stars, and my creative professional journey in Miami began.

With him, I did the art direction and photography production for personalities like Cristina Saralegui, Irma Martinez, and companies such as Miami City Ballet and Digicel. Also, on the side, I had the opportunity to be an actor for the Sociedad Hispanoamericana de Teatro with the play “Cleopatra,” and I became president of the professional association for design, AIGA, Miami Chapter.

Nevertheless, I still felt that I could not express myself professionally as easy as I did in Spanish, so I decided to apply to Miami International University of Art & Design to earn a master’s degree. It wasn’t easy since I was working full time, and several times I contemplated quitting, but I persevered and completed it with honors. After my master’s, I became a creative director, and recently I had the opportunity the work alongside Lenny Kravitz.

I still have a lot to do because I think that the sky is the limit. In the process of continuing to foster my art, I have a 360 solo exhibition from April 19 -30. “Sense, Feeling it or Not” at Art & Design Gallery, on Biscayne Boulevard and 86th Street, where I will display more than 50 paintings, art installations, sculptures, and a dramatized reading of the play “Sala Marco Caridad,” and its English version, “Marco Caridad’s Room.”

Different venues already did something like this in New York with the artist Rothko. For me, it is an honor to do the play in Miami inspired by my art pieces. The most important part is that, unlike Rothko, I am one of the actors in the play, and I will be starring along with Mel Gorham, the Hollywood actress who starred in Wayne Wang’s film, “Smoke and Blue in the Face.”

The Venezuelan playwright Yonyi Gutiérrez wrote the play. The performance will be inside the main room of the exhibition, and the actors will act on top of a 12-foot-long by 6-foot-wide table. The audience will be around them. We performed it in Kendall at Artefactus Project during two weekends in 2016. The audience was moved; several attendees came out with tears in their eyes.

Today, I am happily married and living in Miami Shores.