On Monday, Oct. 27, students enrolled in the Upper School’s Hispanic Studies Advanced course spent the day exploring Little Havana’s Calle Ocho—Southwest 8th Street just west of downtown Miami—to tour the neighborhood often called the beating heart of Cuban culture in the United States. Guided by an anthropologist who has studied the area for more than 20 years, students visited an art gallery, a cigar-rolling shop, a Cuban coffee cafe, and a domino park.
“Many of them [the course’s students] have never set foot in Calle Ocho despite living here in Miami, just a few miles away,” Spanish teacher and field trip organizer María Eva Molina said. “There are things one learns from actually visiting a place that you can’t find in any textbook, like the pride [the locals feel].”
One such firsthand account students heard was from a Cuban immigrant who fled his homeland during the 1959 Revolution, when Fidel Castro’s rise to power led many to rebuild their lives—all while trying to honor their cultures—in the United States. At the Futurama 1637 Art Building, they learned about this history while surrounded by exhibits from more than 37 local artists and 12 studios, highlighting the richness of Hispanic customs and traditions that sophomore Lars Goodrich spoke of.
“Places like this are suspended in time—you look around and see skyscrapers, but Little Havana still feels like a window into what the city once was,” Goodrich said.
The field trip’s group also relished an authentic Cuban meal at Old Havana Cuban Bar & Cocina, where they ordered traditional dishes such as ropa vieja, Cuba’s national dish named for its shredded beef and tomato stew that resembles “old clothes.” Afterward, students gathered for rounds of double-nine dominoes, the island’s national game.
“Playing dominoes stood out the most to me [out of all the field trip’s activities] because it’s something generations before us have done,” junior Gabriela Morales said. “It felt like connecting with the people who built this community.”
Molina, who has led the excursion for more than a decade, held that Little Havana continues to pulse with enlightening information and new cultural dimensions, no matter how many times she visits.
(Megan Markus)
“I’ve done this excursion for more than 15 years, yet, every time I go, I [still] learn something new,” Molina said.
She also noted that the field trip offered an opportunity for students to experience the practices, products, and perspectives of the Spanish-speaking world—an inviolable pillar of the Hispanic Studies Advanced curriculum.
“People came here [to Little Havana] with nothing and built their own stories. That resilience—the belief that hardship doesn’t define you—is what students can carry forward,” Molina said.
