Juan Carlos
Nicaraguan; Now living in Miami
“Nicaragua is something that is part of me, but I don't think I experienced leaving as trauma. I didn't feel that sense of loss, and I never felt a strong desire to go back. I was happy to be in the States. Not that I knew this as a nine-year-old, but I think a lot of that is shaped by being a gay man and feeling like, Thank God that I grew up here. Because who knows what my life would have been like if I'd grown up in Nicaragua. Would I have been closeted my whole life? What kind of pressures would I have had to deal with? In the United States, I was able to be free. Miami is home much more than Managua ever was.”