Sak Pase

I called my sister the other day to wish her a happy 30-something birthday. "What are you talking about?" she said, "Everyone in Cali thinks I'm 29, and I like it that way." She's just like Mom. We left her story on New's Year's Day 1968 when 25-year-old Yolande Mangones took up residence on Chicago's South Side. It had to have been one of the coldest days on record to date, whipping winds made it feel like it was 20 degrees below zero. On January 2nd she trudged through feet of snow to her first day as a staff nurse at Provident Hospital. Fortunately, her upbringing afforded her education in Haiti that included French, English, Spanish and Latin. Adapting to English wasn't insurmountable. While growing up, Mom insisted that we speak only English at home. She felt that it was the best way to integrate into American society and that it would help us with our studies. Yolande was a social and vocal person, so embracing the nuances of A...

I had the honor of telling my mother's immigration story to my daughter's 6th grade class. As I was talking, it struck me that we don't have her remarkable life written down, so I am dedicating this blog to her. My mother, Yolande Mangones, was born in Au Cayes, Haiti in 1943 to a colonel in the army named Corneille Mangones. Yolande's mother, Anaria Beacejour, was a Cuban-African who migrated to Haiti as a child with her parents. Corneille and Anaria were never married, nor did they ever live together. Anaira had nine pregnancies, with four children that survived passed childbirth. Yolande, along with her sister Solange, were raised in their father's house and cared for by their nanny, stepmother, along with various maids, cooks, maintence workers, and drivers. Corneille could afford higher education, so Mom was trained as a Registered Nurse, as were many educated Haitian women at that time. While in nursing school, she met my dad Jean Guichon. They married a...