Hispanic Heritage Week: Ecuadorian Immigrant Makes American Dream A Reality

Even though this man came in illegally in 1979, he is now a citizen, owns his business, employs others and is living the American Dream. DP

By Shazia Khan

NY1.com: Segundo Uzhca usually spends some family time with his wife and son before he leaves for work.

Uzhca is the executive chef at Canedo's, an Italian restaurant he now owns in Bay Ridge. A lot has changed for him since 1979, the year he left his native Ecuador at the age of 18 and made his way to the Mexican-U.S. border.

“There was a small boat when we had to cross the river and there was a lot of people in that small boat and I really got scared for a moment,” recalls Uzhca.

He survived and went on to join his brother in New York who had arrived a few months earlier. Uzhca wanted to make a better life for himself, but never forgot his family back home.

“When I got here and I remember how it was there, so I said, ‘I have to support them; I have to help them,’” says Uzhca.

So he says he worked 13- to 14- hour days, seven days a week as a dishwasher and later as a busboy, earning $300 a week. He would send half of his earnings to his parents and four siblings back home, sometimes more.

“They needed it for food, clothing and education,” says Uzhca.

Knowing this need, he spent very little on himself.

“Paying rent and by saving, not going out for dinner or like nightclubs,” says Uzhca.

That penny pinching paid off, as well as his hard work. He enrolled in English and culinary classes. He married, had a son and became a citizen. In the ‘90s, he opened his own place, using knowledge gained working in Brooklyn Italian restaurants, and brought his parents and some of his siblings to the United States.

“Now they have their own jobs, they have their own homes, and they doing well, too, so it makes me happy about that,” says Uzhca.

Some of Uzhca's employees are in a similar situation he once was in and he says it helps him to be a more understanding boss.

“It opens more my heart to them, you know. I give them more support, I teach them,” says Uzhca.

He hopes they, too, can better their lives, as well as the lives of their families back home.