Chapter 12 For the Children of Nicaragua
Chapter 13 A Suffocating Mask
Chapter 14 The Tortuous Legal Path
Chapter 15 Life through Fire
Chapter 1 Back to Nicaragua
Chapter 2 Finding the True Meaning of My Life
Chapter 3 Every Path Has Its Puddle
Chapter 4 An Unexpected Answer
Chapter 5 APROQUEN: The Divine Mandate!
Chapter 6 Expecting Nothing in Return
Chapter 7 A Queen Arrives from Mexico
Chapter 8 A Dream Come True
Chapter 9 A World of Darkness and Isolation
Chapter 10 And Love United Us . . .
Chapter 1 An Irreplaceable Human Being
Chapter 2 The Burden of Loneliness
Chapter 3 “Here I Am . . . My Ballerina”
Chapter 4 A New Sign
Chapter 5 And If the Fire Still Sears . . .
Testimonials of Those Who Have Shared This Path
Illusions, for our Children, Year after Year
On October 21, 1989, airline TAN SAHSA’s Boeing 727-200, registered as N88705, was a passenger flight en route from San José, Costa Rica, to Miami, with stops in the cities of Managua, Nicaragua, and Tegucigalpa, Honduras. At 7:53 in the morning the plane crashed into Cerro de Hula as it approached the Toncontín International Airport in Tegucigalpa.
135 people died.
Of the 146 passengers on Flight 414, only 11 people survived. Vivian Pellas is one of them. This is her testimony of how she returned from the brink of death and how it changed her life forever as she came to understand the mission she had to fulfill.
They say that when you want to write your life story, the blank page calls for the movie of your life to start. Then . . .
you dust off your fears and count your scars, including those of your body, as well as those of your soul, you tear them open and pick at them until they bleed again.
I’ve asked myself many times, why did all of this happen?What was the purpose of experiencing what I went through?Why was I the protagonist of a story carved by pain?Today I know that happiness comes from following your heart, and I found it in my family and in the smile of a child.
CARLOS PELLAS
When Vivian placed the final text of her autobiography in my hands, and as I became the first reader of this chronicle, I never imagined she would tell her story in such a sublime way. When I finished reading those words, which are now this book, with tears in my eyes I understood why it took her twelve years to write it.
Reliving everything she went through in her life—from her exile from Cuba to the trauma of the plane crash, and considering the implications of the complex and extremely painful rehabilitation she had to endure—must have been, unequivocally, more than an arduous exercise; it was an utter challenge to her spiritual tenacity.
Today I fully understand . . . and I could not hold back the tears as I read all those passages of the book, which deeply moved me. They not only brought back the tortuous moments that I went through, but also made me remember how essential we have been to each other, and how, at the most difficult moments in our journey, we have always been together to support, comfort, and encourage each other, overcoming the challenges that life gives us and that catch us by surprise.
Vivian writes that I was always her inspiration, but the truth of the matter is that she is the one who has inspired me. I have admired her strength and optimism since the moment I met her. Those are the values that empowered her to overcome the hardship of her exile as well as many of the ordeals she has had to face since childhood. I was even more surprised by her strength as she embraced her new homeland: Nicaragua.
Witnessing her torturous rehabilitation sessions heartened me not to give up, and to face the pain with the same courage and determination that she did.
Vivian’s life, which is depicted with simplicity and humility in her autobiography, is not only one of the most compelling stories I have ever read, but also one of the most inspirational ever written. Many people, who face a tragedy in which they unexpectedly lose a loved one or are part of an accident that leaves permanent wounds and critical aftereffects, spend much of their remaining lives lamenting in bitterness, incapable of finding purpose for their existence.
As the reader will be able to see in this narrative, Vivian’s life has not been easy at all, but her optimism and ongoing determination have helped her overcome the obstacles in her path. These challenges have forged her extraordinary character, making her not only a woman with great self-confidence, but also a woman with an enormous heart.
When I met Vivian, I fell in love with her immediately, and at that moment I knew she was the woman I would spend the rest of my life with. Nevertheless, I have to admit I never imagined she would become the Vivian Pellas she is today.
It is admirable how even with her flesh raw and with multiple fractures, she muttered: “I’m going to build a burn unit for children in Nicaragua.” Just at that moment, when anyone else would have been thinking about his or her own plight and extreme pain, she was already exploring her new reason for being, thinking about how to alleviate the suffering of others. She did not blame God for everything that was going on in her life. Quite the contrary: she was trying to find the divine plan that He had devised for her.
On