Brazil is located in central eastern South America.  Its land mass is slightly smaller than the United States.  According the CIA World Factbook, it is home to 192 million citizens.  Brazilians are sometimes confused with Hispanics, which are people of Spanish heritage.  The majority of Brazilians are of Portuguese descent, although about a third are of mixed racial heritage.  Almost 90 percent of Brazilians are Roman Catholic, and religion plays a large role in their lives.  Social life in Brazil revolves around the family.  Most live close to family throughout their lives. When immigrating, many follow family members or maintain their family ties back home by keeping in touch and sending money.

Brazilian immigration to the United States increased dramatically during the “lost decade” of the 1980s.  At that time Brazil was transitioning from a military dictatorship to a democracy, and governmental corruption and economic instability led many into poverty.  Hyperinflation, a declining standard of living for the middle class and a lack of faith in the Brazilian government’s ability to improve the situation prompted many to leave their homeland in search of a better life with financial stability.

Sometimes referred to as “Brazucas,” a slang term for Brazilians living in the United States, Brazilian-Americans defy common immigrant stereotypes.  Most are middle-class and relatively well educated.  Many have college degrees and held skilled jobs in Brazil, but some find it difficult to find comparable jobs in the United States because of different degree requirements.  In Brazil, it is common for middle-class families to have maids, and some women who had maids or servants in Brazil are upset to assume those roles in America.

Today, there are several established communities of Brazilian immigrants in the United States, particularly in New York City, Boston and South Florida. In Florida, immigrants are mostly concentrated in Pompano Beach, Deerfield Beach and North Bay Village. These communities, filled with Brazilian restaurants and stores, display the pride many Brazilians have in their heritage and speak to their strong cultural ties.

Many Brazilian immigrants describe their situation in the United States as temporary, insisting that they are just passing through until they can make enough money to return to Brazil comfortably.

But although the Jewish Cuban community is intricately connected to Miami’s Cuban community, it is not contained to the area known as “Little Havana.”

Under duress, the Jews of Cuba came to America because they did not want to live under a communist regime, as many of them were local, small store owners. This would not be the first exodus out of a homeland for the Cuban Jews as most came from Eastern Europe during World War II.

That is why the State of Israel means so much to them. According to Dr. Jaime Suchlicki, director of the Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies at the University of Miami, Cuban Jews have already lost their first homeland.

Dr. Suchlicki estimates that there were approximately 12,000 Jews living in Havana during the 1960s.  But as Hitler rose to power in Europe and Fidel Castro’s communist regime began to take hold of Cuba, about 9,000 Cuban Jews decided to flee the island between 1960 and 1961.

Most Cuban refugees ended up in Miami, New York or Puerto Rico.  Of those who settled in South Florida, Miami Beach was the most appealing location because it already had a thriving and highly concentrated Jewish population and ultimately Cuban Hebrew Temples began cropping up.  Temple Moses is one of them.

Like many other tight-knit communities, however, the Cuban Jewish community, who self-identify as “Jewbans”, began to diffuse from its original Miami Beach location over the years.  Yet, most are members of the Cuban Hebrew congregations in Miami Beach, as well as Temple Beth Shmuel and Temple Menorah.

Today there are about 800 Jews still in Cuba, according to Dr. Suchlicki.  Although there have not been any known acts of anti-Semitism on the island, Castro’s regime has yet to recognize the State of Israel as a country.

Adela Dworin, president of the Jewish community in Cuba, recalled to a NY Times reporter that when she first met Fidel Castro in 1998, he had never heard of Hannukah, a well known Jewish holiday.  That year, after being invited by Dworin to a Hannukah celebration, Castro celebrated Hannukah with the Cuban Jewish community for the first time.

When the lower class population began migrating in the 1970s and 1980s, the destination changed to one most accessible by boat-Miami.  In the early 1970s, Haitian refugees began arriving in South Florida in significant numbers. By the end of that decade, the number of Haitians living in Miami numbered around 50,000 to 70,000.

Unlike the Cuban refugees fleeing from Castro’s regime, Haitians did not receive the same support from the Reagan administration and were plagued with negative stereotypes, according to Stepick. In the late 1970s, it was believed that an outbreak of tuberculosis in the poor neighborhoods of Miami was directly related to the influx of Haitian immigrants. Similar stereotypes ensued in the mid-80s with an AIDS epidemic.

Little Haiti, originally known in Miami as “Lemon City” because of the abundance of lemon trees in the area, is one of the most recognizable Haitian communities in the country and one of the oldest neighborhoods in the city of Miami.

According to Dr. Stepick, Little Haiti’s borders are as follows: The western border is NW 7th Ave. and its eastern border is US Route 1. The Design District marks its southern border at 36th Street and Miami’s Catholic Cathedral of St. Mary at 81st Street marks its northern.

The 2005-2007 American Community Survey was the first official report detailing Venezuelans in South Florida, making trends harder to pinpoint.

Richard Ogburn, assistant to the Director for Research and Budget at the South Florida Regional Planning Council, said that the noted trend of more Venezuelans coming to this region began around four or five years ago, for several reasons.

“When you have an area like South Florida with so much of your growth being drawn from outside, external events have a significant effect on the inflow of immigrants,” Ogburn said.

He said that the reason more Venezuelans started coming in the early to mid part of this decade was due to a combination of political and economic factors.

“When we saw the political changes in Venezuela, we started to see people coming,” Ogburn said.

Venezuelans are spread throughout Miami-Dade and Broward Counties, but there is a higher concentration of Venezuelans in Doral, Weston and Kendall. Weston and Doral have even earned the nicknames “Westonzuela” and “Doralzuela” because of the Venezuelan populations there, said Ernesto Ackerman, president of Independent Venezuelan American Citizens, a non-profit group advocating Venezuelan political involvement.