Jason Estremera

EF: Today is Wednesday, September 24, 2014. Can you tell us your full name, please?

JE: Jason Estremera. 

EF: Okay. Where were you born and where did you grow up?

JE: I was born in Cleveland, but I grew up in Chicago. 

EF: What is your heritage?

JE: Uh, I guess, half Puerto Rican and half White, for lack of a better term. 

EF: When did you move to Ohio?

JE: Um, you mean to Chicago or…? [EF: To Ohio] To Ohio, just four years ago. 

Jason Estremera Youtube Interview

Jason was interviewed in Cleveland, OH.

EF:  What were those first memories that you have of first arriving here? 

JE: That it was dead. That there was nothing to do. At the time, I just had bought a place in Ohio City, so I didn’t really know anything about Ohio City at the time and at first, it seemed like a very, “Yeah, okay, there’s some stuff to do but, where’s all the people at?” you know, “Where, where’s the hustle n’ bustle? Where’s the train sounds? Where’s all this …” and there was none of that and, I was so used to that growing up. I was so um, it was a very white-washed neighborhood so I was like, “Where is the cultural diversity that I’m used to, in there?” So that was my first shock was, “Wow, I’m in like honky-tonk land” you know, “It’s dead, nothing to do” that was my first impression, honestly.

 Cleveland is really great for the connections that you can make and it’s kind of a very small community, [with a] big city kind of feel, you know, where you have the chance to meet with very important individuals and very easily.

EF: You said your life is almost as busy as it was, or busier, than in Chicago. What, in these four years, what has made you feel more part of this community? 

JE: Well, I think that Cleveland is really great for the connections that you can make and it’s kind of a very small community, [with a] big city kind of feel, you know, where you have the chance to meet with very important individuals and very easily. And so, when I was with JP Morgan Chase, I was introduced to the Nshmba, the young Latino Network, The Hispanic Round Table, all these organizations, and being that the Hispanic community was small but growing, they’re looking for more members and getting involved, and then it was very easy for me to get kind of wrapped up and now, I am the president for the Young Latino Network and on the board for the Metro-Health Foundation and, I was doing my Master’s at the time so I was meeting individuals from that. So it was just a matter of, um, getting out – literally just walk out your front door and you’re gonna bump into someone that’s like, “Hey, who are you? What do you do? Who do you know? What do you want to do? Here ya go” and, and they’ll take you along with them for a ride so, yeah. 

EF: Great. Um, you have family here in Ohio? [JE: Yes] Okay, and what are some of the, specifically Puerto Rican traditions that your family has tried to keep alive or you feel that has been passed to you? 

JE: Um, well that’s funny because my immediate family, none. Even despite growing up in Chicago, in that area, we never maintained any traditions of like The Three Kings or like um, my mom never cooked Puerto Rican food so it was always, you go out for it or you were just as excited to come to Cleveland so you can go to grandma’s house and get the real good stuff so, now that I’m back and I am with my family, my extended family, I would have to say specifically to being Puerto Rican just, as soon as you go over anyone’s house, the pan hits  the stove and you’re eating, um, but I don’t participate in any sort of um, traditional, Puerto Rican, um … l like activities or anything, so I’m bad for that. 

EF: you mentioned you’re the president of the Young Latino Network? Can you tell me about that? 

JE: It’s great. So our mission is civic engagement and leadership development, so we exist to kind of bridge the gap between these open opportunities and connecting with the Hispanic community, so as the work force demographics are changing, right? Um, the aging work force is getting ready to retire, companies are coming to me like, “Whoa a third of our work force is getting ready to go but we need to be more inclusive and our company is to reflect other customers and clients that we serve … how do we get your people in here?” So it’s a matter of getting our members prepped, you know, workshops, leadership development opportunities, civic, getting involved in the community, building up the resume, building up their connections, and then being able to help move them to the next step of their life, be it personally or professionally. So, I’m tasked with kind of, building relationships with organizations in the city, finding ways to support the members on my board, to make sure they’re getting something out of having these connections themselves, so when we’re done with our two-year term, what is the next step for you? As well as fundraising opportunities, we have our own scholarship fund, so there’s great programs like Cleveland Bridge Builders, but many of those programs come with a hefty price tag so, how do I make sure to someone in my community who, perhaps it was a struggle just getting to where they are today, but now they’re tasked with, “Well I want to do this, this development series, but it’s thousands of dollars …” Well, we are able to actually, give funds for our own community to make sure they are at the table with other individuals so that the higher up the ladder you go, we can help prevent it from being so white, when you get up there. 

EF: Can you share some of the success stories that you’ve had in your involvement with this network? 

JE: Well the biggest would be our noche de guayabera annual fundraiser. So we did phenomenally in that, in that respect, raised a lot of money, did it more efficiently than I think it was done in the past, and so we were able raise a ton of funds and so this year we will be able to provide scholarships to more. Last year we were able to provide a thousand dollar scholarship to a member to go to the Cleveland Bridge Builder’s Program, then we were also able to provide a scholarship for an Esperanza Inc. child—Esperanza is the building upstairs—who is physically handicapped and so that was a financial burden on the family alone but then he is, rather, a very intelligent child and was able to get into college but, he needed some funds, he needed scholarships, so we were able to give him a scholarship fund for that amount um … our food drives, our toy drives, those have come out very successful um, voting is a big issue for us, so we’re now getting a population at the table so we’ve been successful in being able to partner with different agencies in the city, and we actually have an event coming up shortly to raise awareness, get people motivated about issues that are crucial to our community, but letting them know that if you don’t show up, it’ll never change, you know. And so those have been some successes.

EF: What has been one of the most memorable times of being here? And also, what has been one of the most difficult times, of being here? 

JE: The most memorable would be the first year I was here, Ingenuity Festival, I discovered that and I remember, are you familiar with Ingenuity Festival? [EF: No] it’s one of its kind. It’s a very, it’s a technology, art … performance kind of big, three-day event here in Cleveland. They’re mixing technology, lasers and video games and big insulation pieces and, it used to be underneath the Detroit Avenue bridge, in the old Viaduct, and it was really cool—I mean the first year I came in there you’re entering into this old tunnel-way and you’re underneath this bridge that’s over water and you’ve got just these grates that kind of cover where you’re walking but you look down and it’s just water and you have these art performances and, and you move through a hallway and the sound of your body moving changes the light spectrums and, it’s just really awesome—they turn the bridge into a waterfall, so they had a guy come in and  the whole bridge was just this massive waterfall. It was just the coolest thing and I was just like, “Wow” you know? Like, “Whoa … this is Cleveland?” So I think that was a big eye-opener to the potential that I wasn’t seeing because I had, I was just being a sour-puss about being here and I think it was that moment when I discovered some of the things that are happening, that I left all that behind me. All of the negative vibes. The most difficult, part about being in Cleveland … um … hmm … I guess it would only just be the fact that all my friends live back in Chicago and essentially they have become my family so, having grown up there my entire life I would just come to Cleveland maybe two times a year, Thanksgiving and Christmas, but when I stayed in Chicago on my own and my immediate family moved back, I didn’t even come back, maybe once every two years because I’d be overseas traveling, Spain, Paris, and I would just visit friends over there. So when I tore myself away from my essential family in Chicago to come here, the hardest part was: Yes, they’re my family but, they were still strangers to me. Meeting some of my second cousins, third cousins, even some of my immediate cousins for the first time, and trying to develop a relationship, especially the ones on the Puerto Rican side, because our, our last name is so well-known, every time I would go somewhere and they would say, “Do you know this Estremera or that Estremera?” and I’m like, “No. I really, really don’t” And so, building those relationships and trying to become part of the family I think was probably the hardest part of being here. 

EF: You mentioned finding things that made you see Cleveland in a different way and you mentioned something about community, what message or advice would you give to those newcomers? It could be Latinos or non-Latinos, immigrants, what would you say to them about this community? 

JE: I would tell them that there’s never any need to worry about becoming anything you want it to be, because … being a complete outsider, and having moved here myself, it was so easy to make a connection. All I had to do was just step outside of my own personal bubble, right? Things I wasn’t comfortable doing: being in front of a crowd, talking in front of a camera, you know putting yourself out there but, the second you do, the opportunities are endless and  I’ve seen that, just people who come here and for business assistance. If I say, “Here’s this person, you should go talk to them” and they do it, well then they’ve just expanded their network and I think that, for people who are coming here as an immigrant or anybody for the first time, there is something for everybody, it’s very easy to get connected and, whatever it is that your personal path is, right? Or professional path that you want to accomplish, it will happen, you just have to take that first step and look for it, you know? There’s tons of organizations, young professional organizations, boards, places that want newcomers to be on it so they can bring some sort of freshness to the city so that it does reflect the changing demographics of Cleveland itself. 

EF: Since you’ve had this experience of living in a place like Chicago, which is very diverse and and now living here in sort of the epicenter of the Latino community in Cleveland, can you provide some of those insights like, what do you see, some of the differences  in these two communities and the uniqueness of each one? 

JE: Okay, I think that in terms of the Hispanic community at large, in Chicago, you have a much larger portion of the population that are Mexican, Cleveland it’s very Puerto Rican, even Dominican, there’s a much larger population than it was in Chicago. And so I guess, the difference I want to say is that  I wasn’t as involved as I was … in the community in Chicago as I am now, so every community can be very fragmented, right, so I don’t know from like, the inside perspective, but I would say that there was a better representation maybe, and then by, of the various cultures there because you knew this area, you could go get Mexican stuff, Mexican food and this was your Puerto Rican neighborhood and, if you wanted something from Uruguay or whatever, you’d go over here and, you had all those in your little bodegas and you can see that in here it’s a little sparse. I mean you have your pocket right here on West 25^th and Clarke, but it’s not as concentrated. I think that in Chicago they were able to find whatever magical equation it was so they could work like this, to really bring up the neighborhood and promote themselves. I think in Cleveland, they’re still trying to figure out what that is, how do we do it and kind of move past some bad blood that has prevented anything from happening here where you have a this type of village, you have a Little Italy, you have all that that’s kinda been branded and they were able to get together with it. Here, I feel like that’s still an issue and that is preventing some progress from happening, whereas in Chicago I think they already had that taken care of, they figured it out, they worked on it and now it’s there. 

EF:  What does Ohio mean to you?

JE: What does Ohio mean to me? I think, ultimately, just on my journey, Ohio has meant to me change. Not only was it a change of my surroundings, physically, but it was a change in the way I was living my life, myself. And I think that, because there was that, there is that room to grow, and me coming from a city like Chicago, I’ve been able to come here and actually make a difference. And you don’t have to fight through a crowd of people to get involved in something, and so, it offers change for myself but also change for the community because I know that, having that experience or that knowledge of, maybe some things in the past that haven’t been able to die off, it will, shortly, but I know that I’m part of the new people, that are bringing everything into perspective and actually representing today’s young Latino. I think that, as Ohio itself is learning to change and become more progressive in its ways, just in general. I was surprised when I thought of what Ohio is and, and the people that lived here, and then I came here and … you get a little bit of what I thought it was gonna be, but everyone’s working so hard to change that and so, in general, in a nutshell, whatever the case is I think Ohio means change to me. 

EF: Would you consider yourself more in touch with your culture here than in Chicago?

JE: Yes, I think that I interacted with the Hispanic part of myself in Chicago, but I would just go places, I would go to art shows or clubs and, things like that, and then you just kind of participated in it. But here, I’m actually woven into kind of the fabric of the community and I’m making decisions and I’m worried about where we’re going to be next and how do we promote the members of the community? So I feel like I’m definitely more in touch here um, in that respect. Yeah.