The initial home of the Miami Cubans was a few miles west of downtown in what became LITTLE HAVANA, whose streets, if the tourist brochures are to be believed, are filled by old men playing dominoes while puffing on fat, fragrant cigars, and exotic restaurants whose walls vibrate to the pulsating rhythms of the homeland. Naturally, the reality is quite different. Little Havana's parks, memorials, shops and food stands all reflect the Cuban experience but the streets are quieter than those of downtown Miami (except during the Little Havana Festial in early March). Many successful Cuban-Americans have moved to Coral Gables or elsewhere in the city, to be replaced by immigrants from elsewhere in Central America, especially Nicaragua. By all means make a beeline here for lunch at one of the many small restaurants on SW 8th Street, or Calle Ocho (its main drag), but don't expect monuments and museums - Little Havana's a neighborhood geared toward those who lie and work, rather than visit, there.

There is, however, a cluster of memorials between 12th and 13th avenues along Calle Ocho that underscores the Cuban-American experience in Miami. Here, the simple stone Brigade 2506 Memorial remembers those who died at the Bay of Pigs on April 17, 1961, during the abortive invasion of Cuba by US-trained Cuban exiles. veterans of the landing, aging men dressed in combat fatigues, gather here for each anniversary and make all-night-long pledges of patriotism.

Cubans in Miami
During the mid-Fifties, when opposition to Cuba's Batista dictatorship began to assert itself, a trickle of Cubans started arriving in a predominantly Jewish section of Miami called riverside. The trickle became a flood when Fidel Castro took power in 1959, and the area became Little Havana, populated by the affluent Cuban middle classes who had the most to lose under communism.