Haitians, despite obstacles, plant city roots

Entering Wilda Randolph's town home on Mass. Ave. in northwest Cambridge, visitors see that her children are growing up with a television, telephone and a stocked refrigerator.

Simple things.

But when Randolph arrived in Massachusetts 20 years ago, she had hardly anything. Arriving with her sick mother-in-law in the middle of winter, she spoke no English, had no job and was far from the warm shores of her native Haiti.

The last two decades have hardly been rosy. She was evicted from her apartment earlier this year. Her house burned down nine years ago. She divorced her husband several years after she arrived. She dreamed of getting a Ph.D. but because of the constraints of jobs and single motherhood, she has not been able to complete her GED.

But she says, in the end, she came to America to survive and give her children a better chance at life--a chance that would have denied in the tumultuous world of Haiti.

She says she has no plans to return to Haiti, and she is even planning to bring her mother to Cambridge and she hopes someday that her siblings will join her. And while Randolph's story mirrors the hard-scrabble existence for Haitians in Cambridge, political turmoil at home ensures that this recent immigrant wave is here for the long haul.

Coming to America

Randolph set foot on American soil for the first time in 1980, when she arrived in Florida as a newlywed with her husband, an Asian-American airman who had been stationed in Haiti.

The visit was brief, long enough to get her green card and make the arrangements to set up a new business--a chicken farm--in Haiti.

But it was less than a year before Randolph returned to America. This time, bringing with her a sick mother-in-law, she was greeted by a harsh Boston winter that was a far cry from her weather at home.

"I hated it," she says.

Nevertheless, Randolph never returned to live in Haiti.

Upon arriving, Randolph says, she bought into the myth of America perpetuated in her home country.

"At that time, [people] saw coming to the U.S. as everything… you're going to find it here!" she says. "But they didn't understand that you had to work hard to get a lot of stuff."

Knowing no English, Randolph got a job cleaning in Boston.

Cleaning jobs are often the first employment Haitian immigrants find, says Haitian Multiservice Center Director Jean Jeune.

"There used to be two factories here that would hire people," Jeune says. "Since they closed, people only have opportunities cleaning restaurants, hospitals or nursing homes. And they are lucky to find that."

But five months after Randolph began work, she found out she was pregnant.

She speaks of how, in Haiti, people who had been to America would bring pennies they said that they found in the street. But Randolph soon found out otherwise.

"They told me I was going to find money here," she says. "I'm still working hard for the money!"

At the beginning of her pregnancy, her husband had to return to Haiti, leaving Randolph to live with her father, who had moved to Greater Boston in 1973.

When her husband returned 10 months later, the couple moved to Cambridge, where Randolph has lived ever since.

Cambridge Community

Over the last two decades, things have changed for Randolph. Now a single mother of two--she and her husband are divorced--she speaks fluent English, works as a kindergarten teaching assistant at the Graham & Parks School and recently moved into a new townhouse.

While Randolph struggled to learn English, she did not have to deal with illiteracy--a problem for an estimated 80 percent of Haitian immigrants, Jeune says.

"People come from Haiti with a very high illiteracy rate," Jeune says. "Often, they need years of basic reading and writing programs."

However, Randolph is the first to admit that her life has been no Cinderella tale.

"We came to America and I had to work hard," she says. "I had to work hard to get where I am now."

She recalls Halloween of 1991, when a house fire left her family without a home for two months.

"Oh my God! I didn't know what to do," she says, sitting forward in her chair, eyes wide. "I was shaking and scared."

In the fire, Randolph lost the few things that she had brought with her from Haiti: a picture of her mother and herself, and some French music that she had copied. Both, she says, were remembrances of her youth.

However, childhood memories have popped up in Cambridge in unexpected ways. For instance, Randolph has run across several of her childhood friends within the Cambridge community.

She even tells the story of a co-worker whose cousin married one of Randolph's relatives in Haiti.

Such an event is no longer so unusual. The Haitian community in Cambridge--concentrated in Fresh Pond and Central Square--has swelled since the early 1980s, Jeune says.

Cambridge has a unique attraction for immigrants, Jeune says.

"People like to come here," Jeune says. "They feel that this is where the influential political people are."

While Randolph admits that she knows very little of life in America outside of Cambridge, she says that it is a "special city."

For example, Randolph spent four years in America as a non-English speaker, but she says there was no shortage of friendly help.

"I didn't know a lot of people in Cambridge back then," she says. "But even if you speak English or you don't speak English, you will find someone to help you."

She recalls an instance during those four years, when, in Star Market, a complete stranger helped her fill out her checkbook.

When asked if she has ever felt rejected within the community, Randolph shrugs her shoulders and says, "I don't really know and I don't really care… I want to survive."

Stormy Seas

And Randolph has indeed survived--but even today, her struggles have not ended.

In February, her house was condemned due to foundational problems, leaving Randolph and her two children, ages 14 and 17, without a home for five months.

During this time, the family lived with a friend while they looked for an apartment.

Randolph qualifies for Section 8 assistance, a federal funding program that subsidizes rent for low-income families.

But the apartment search took so long, she explains, because she did not want to leave the Cambridge school district, and she wanted to avoid bringing her family into public housing.

"In those five months, I learned so much," she says. "You don't know the value of things until you lose them. That's what I tell my kids."

In fact, Randolph explains one of her worries about raising her children in America is that they will take things for granted. And though the recent turn of events was unfortunate, it certainly helped in this respect.

"We pulled together during that time," says her 17-year-old son, Vladimir.

Sending Help

Two of Randolph's siblings now also live in the U.S., and they take turns each month sending money back home.

In six months, Randolph says she plans to bring her mother to America--a move that has already been approved by the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

"I want her to come here, to see life," she says. "In Haiti there is always stress. I want her to come here to relax."

When questioned as to whether her other six siblings will ever come to America, she quickly answers, "someday."

When Randolph returned to Haiti after her brother's death in 1992, she took with her clothes and money for friends and relatives.

Randolph says her visit convinced her that she never wants to live in Haiti again and made her appreciate America even more.

"It wasn't just that I appreciated America," she says. "I can put it higher than that."

She was grateful, she says, that, as opposed to the people in Haiti, "I have somewhere to go."

Randolph says the thing she most appreciates is the freedom that she has found.

"You have your own power, you can work for money, you can be an independent woman," she says.

Randolph mentions how difficult it is for a single mother to be able to provide for her children in Haiti. She also mentions the rampancy of AIDS in Haiti, especially among youth, and the danger it would have posed to her own children.

"I think, 'What about if I had had them in my country?'" she says.

Future Investment

Two years ago, Randolph became an American citizen.

"I had two kids here," she said, also citing travel security and ease in getting loans as major reasons for citizenship.

Now, these two children are what Randolph puts her hope in.

"I used to dream about getting my Ph.D.," says Randolph, whose work toward her GED was interrupted when she lost her house in February.

"Now I want to see my goal accomplished through [my children]," she says. "After that, I don't mind if I die."

Vladimir is a senior at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School, and is involved in both an internship in the hotel industry and an educational program called Upward Bound.

He says he plans to attend college to pursue a career in either computer design or business.

And Randolph's daughter, Joanne, 14, is an eighth-grader at the Tobin School.

"When you come to the United States, you have to focus on what you want," Randolph says. "The opportunity is there, you have to grab what you want."

"I have two kids," she says. "I'm doing what a mother is supposed to do."