Urban dreams
 Richard Andrade (center, holding daughter Yazmin) is surrounded by family, mother Eunice, father Joequinn, and son Richard Jr., in the Hancock Market, a fixture in the Cape Verdean community. |
Uphams Corner is a long way from the tropical winds that kiss the Cape Verde Islands. But this gritty Dorchester neighborhood is home to thousands of immigrants from the tiny 10-island nation off the coast of Africa. This urban crossroad brings persevering Cape Verdeans together in markets and restaurants, where funana music plays and the sizzling aroma of catchupa stew hangs in the air.
It was in this "rough spot" that Richard Andrade, 27, grew up. His father, Joaquin, is on disability, says Andrade, and his mother, Eunice, works as a cleaning women for the YWCA in Cambridge.
Andrade has seen it all: "bad apples, vulnerable kids, gangsters, thugs." He himself dropped out of school, got arrested, and had two children by the age of 23. The odds seemed against him.
But Andrade, who has worked for six years at Boston City Hall and is a fiscal administrative assistant at the Elderly Commission, turned his life around and is now determined to go back to school this fall. "I want to be a good role model for my kids," he says. "I've made it my goal to further my education."
Andrade is the youngest of seven kids who slept two or more to a room in a walk-up brownstone off a quiet alley. His mother taught him responsibility at a young age, showing him how to "make eggs at age 8 (the first and only time I burnt them), and to iron at age 11." He worked long hours at a Columbia Road pharmacy, fell in love, and had two kids, Richard, 4, and Yazmin, 9 months. Although he is going through a divorce now, his daily routine is to pick up Richard and take him
to the daycare center at the City Hall Plaza. Together they walk to Dudley Station and take the Silver Line to Temple Place downtown. "Being a dad is the most important thing in the world to me," says Andrade. "That's something I learned from my parents."
Andrade can afford to buy his kids more toys than he ever received as a child. He remembers his childhood: When his friends were getting video games as gifts, he got socks and underwear. But that was okay, he says. "My parents taught me to be grateful."
He still doesn't mind getting socks and underwear as presents. But for his kids? Well, one of these days they might get a Nintendo Wii. "But they'll have to work for it," he says.
