Cuban Couple Reunited in Texas After Harrowing Sea Odyssey

Cuban Couple Reunited in Texas After Harrowing Sea Odyssey

Almost a year after he smuggled his way out of Cuba on a homemade boat,
Jose Caballero was reunited late Thursday with his wife who survived a
harrowing sea voyage of her own last month. The two embraced tightly at
the Greyhound bus terminal in Austin, Texas, hours after Mailin Perez
crossed the border from Mexico, taking advantage of a U.S. policy that
allows entry to Cubans arriving by land.

Perez, 30, was one of a group of Cuban migrants rescued at sea by
Mexican fishermen this month badly sunburned and dehydrated after three
weeks adrift. Only 15 of the 32 passengers on her boat survived the
journey, with 15 dying at sea, and two more dying after they were
rescued. "It was such a battle to get here," she said. Caballero left
Cuba by the same route in December and is now a maintenance worker at a
trucking company in Austin. The couple left two children behind with
relatives in Cuba, a boy aged 11 and a girl aged four. "That's our hope
now, to bring them to the United States," said Caballero. "But not the
way we came. Not by sea."

Source: Cuban Couple Reunited in Texas After Harrowing Sea Odyssey - NBC
News.com -
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/cuban-couple-reunited-texas-after-harrowing-sea-odyssey-n212141