GONZÁLEZ: Hey everybody, I’m Ana.

NUNES: I’m Alex. You’re listening to Mosaic. And today’s episode is a love story, right?

GONZÁLEZ: Yes! Well, kind of. It starts here, with Hernán: GONZÁLEZ: I'm going to record you saying this.

HERNÁN JOURDAN: So let's do it. So this is, we are, right now, talking about how to make mate. 

GONZÁLEZ: — in a cozy little apartment on Wickenden Street in Providence, learning how to make the most popular drink in Argentina. 

HERNÁN: And so I'm telling Ana, how we start with a mate gourd. This one is iron cast, and it comes from my grandmother. And I also have a straw, which is also metal and it comes from my other grandmother. And so we have the water that's boiling now. [WATER BOILS] I’ll go turn it off.

GONZÁLEZ: I’m talking with Hernán Jourdan. He’s an Argentinian artist, musician, fellow podcast host, and arts facilitator who lives in Providence. 

HERNÁN: And then we'll start seeing how the steam comes out of the thermos, thermo. And so it's good practice, I've learned, to let the tea, the yerba, rest before you put the straw in, so you want to activate the loose leaf tea...

GONZÁLEZ: Hernán’s apartment is a classic old Providence flat. The wooden floors are ancient, with wide boards that have huge gaps between them. Everything is kind of slanted. That, paired with the art on the walls, the string lights over the fireplace, and the steam from the mate -- 

HERNÁN: [Sound of mate slurping] That’s the sound of a good mate. 

GONZÁLEZ: -- makes it feel homey, warm. Even though, when it comes down to it, Hernán is alone.

HERNÁN: The idea of mate, which I find really nice, is that is something meant to be shared. So you're sharing with other people as you're drinking. So you're passing it and then people give it back to you to the person who is pouring down the water and then you give it to one of the person and so it's a it's a group thing them it is meant to be shared, which obviously I don't do very often here because I don't have anybody to share it with [laughter].

GONZÁLEZ: See, the interesting thing about Hernán is that his whole life in Providence is about bringing people together through art, conversation and beautiful little spaces like the one in his apartment. But at the end of the day, he’s all by himself. 

NUNES: But he doesn’t sound too upset about that. 

GONZÁLEZ: Yeah, I don’t think he is at this point. And I think that’s because feeling lonely is a big part of the immigrationg process, and for Hernán, he’s kind of used to it. 

NUNES: How so?

GONZÁLEZ: Well to understand that, we need to back to Argentina and learn how Hernán’s dad lost his hearing.

HERNÁN: So one day he just woke up and he experienced really strange sound in his, I think his left ear. He went to the doctor. By the time he went there, he couldn't hear any more from that ear. So it was due to stress that had killed these cells, and those cells don't regenerate.

GONZÁLEZ: Hernán is 15 at the time, living in the suburb of Buenos Aires where he had lived his whole life. And Argentina is going through a political and economic crisis. 

NUNES: Basically, the government runs out of money. People can’t take cash out of the banks because there’s no cash to take out. Thousands of people lose their jobs, including Hernán’s mom, and it all comes to a head in December of 2001. Riots and protests against the government turn violent and deadly.

GONZÁLEZ: And Hernán is witnessing all of this while his parents lose their livelihoods.

HERNÁN: My dad also going into bankruptcy and not seeing us for several months. And as a consequence of this turmoil, he actually lost his hearing in one ear.

NAR: ANA: So, to deal with this, Hernán turns to music.  

HERNÁN: I started a band soon after that, and I was going to punk rock music concerts all the time. And that was very fun and being able to build community with other people.

GONZÁLEZ: It’s the early 2000s, so groups like Green Day and NOFX are the cool, anti-establishment punk bands that appeal to Hernán. 

NUNES: These are bands that openly criticize the US government. So, by listening to them, Hernán is learning that he can question his government. He thinks about the protests happening all around him.

HERNÁN: Why this is happening? Why are we witnessing the…. I don't know exactly what the right term in English would be..

GONZÁLEZ: [OFF-MIC] You can say it Spanish

HERNÁN: Bueno, está bien. Es que la gente perdió la fé en las instituciones políticas…

GONZÁLEZ: He says the people of Argentina lost their faith in political institutions. And Hernán is beginning to think that, to understand all of this turmoil in his homeland, he needs to get a more international perspective. 

NUNES: So, after high school, Hernán applies for a scholarship to attend a university in Japan. He’s been studying Japanese, and this scholarship would allow him to take classes in Japanese language and filmmaking. And he gets it.

GONZÁLEZ: He’s 18 and ready to take on the world. Literally. But when he gets to Japan, the experience is different than he imagined.

HERNÁN: It was hard because I was alone without my family and friends for the first time, and I was only 18 years old. At that time, I thought that I could take it. And I thought that I could rule the world, you know? Cus I was 18. But also, yes, I was feeling a lot of loneliness and sadness. Even departing from a friend would feel like an anxious process because I was going back to a house that was empty because I was living by myself. 

NUNES: But he makes it through the three years of school and goes back to Argentina. He gets a job in film and starts living his adult life there. But he’s not being totally open about who he is.

GONZÁLEZ: Hernán is gay, and he hasn’t come out to his family. So, he decides, if he’s going to stay in Argentina, he has to be open about his sexuality. 

HERNÁN: I decided to confront my father and tell him these things about myself. And his reaction which was shocking to me at the time. Namely, he basically ostracized me. He said that he didn't want to see me again. And so I said, Well, okay, what do I do? 

GONZÁLEZ: It’s January 2011, and Hernán decides to leave Argentina and go...well, just go. 

HERNÁN: Okay, so, let's see.

GONZÁLEZ: So, yeah, what do we what are we looking at this? This smaller map?

HERNÁN: Yeah, so this is this map I printed in my mom's studio at the time...

GONZÁLEZ: Hernán is showing me a crinkly map of South America with notes of dates and places and highlighted lines all over it. It’s the record of his trip from one end of the continent to the other. 

HERNÁN: And this is pretty much the day before I was leaving. The only thing that I had with me was a backpack, a guitar and bus ticket out to Mendoza...

GONZÁLEZ: Hernán travels west out of Buenos Aires and then north, following the Andean mountain range. 

NUNES: He goes by bus at first, but then he walks and hitchhikes. He plays guitar and sings on the street to pay his way from one town to the next. It’s a very romantic, nomadic existence, but it’s masking a lot of pain. 

HERNÁN: I think a thing that's important to say is that I didn't know when I was coming back, I had no agenda whatsoever. My only idea was to visit different places in Latin America and make sense of this traumatic experience I just had.

GONZÁLEZ: Hernán makes friends with other wanderers and hippies, but never for more than a few weeks. He’s sleeping on couches and in cheap motels. His only real company is in the books he reads, the journals he keeps, and the music he’s listening to. 

NUNES: When he gets to Peru, Hernán purchases a copy of Bob Dylan’s biography. He reads it as he travels up to Ecuador.

GONZÁLEZ: Hernán says that Bob Dylan’s experiences of leaving home behind, feeling alienated from society and searching for something that he couldn’t quite put his finger on, that felt like his experiences. It was like Bob Dylan was singing just to him. 

NUNES: And it’s around this time that the whole trip is becoming less romantic, and reality is setting in.

HERNÁN: I was in Colombia when I didn't know how to continue the trip.

GONZÁLEZ: Hernán had been travelling for 8 months straight, and he’s sleeping in a seedy motel at the time. Every day is the same: busk all day in cafes and restaurants to pay for his room and food. Pass out, and do it again.  

HERNÁN: Going up to Central America seemed to be quite dangerous. Just because in Colombia, la guerilla, the FARC were out and active. And I felt like foolish exposure to put myself in that risk. And the only way to really get to Central America would have been to take a succession of boats…

NUNES: He’s in his motel room, thinking about his options, when Bob’s Dylan’s “Like A Rolling Stone” comes on the radio. 

GONZÁLEZ: And this song makes Hernán so sad because he’s realizing that the life of the rolling stone isn’t what he thought it was going to be. It’s lonely and tough, and he’s struggling to find a meaning to all of it. 

NUNES: Hernán had also been following Bob Dylan’s Neverending Tour, which has been going since 1988, and he sees that the old folk singer is going to be playing in New York City in a few weeks. So, he buys a plane ticket from Bogotá to JFK. 

HERNÁN: I wanted to come to New York basically to see Bob Dylan live, and that’s what I did. I came up to New York with 200 bucks in my pocket, thinking that was a lot of money at the time. And in two weeks, I was broke, but I had seen Bob Dylan play live, and I was on my way to Chicago with a friend I had met through couchsurfing.

NUNES: So, Hernán makes it to New York, an entirely new country, and then he just leaves again and keeps on traveling?

GONZÁLEZ: Yeah, I mean, he still doesn’t have a plan. He’s certainly not thinking of immigrating to a new country. And, he still hasn’t found what he’s looking for. 

NUNES: Which is what?

GONZÁLEZ: A home. Or, at least something to anchor his life a little bit. But things kind of change when he reaches Grand Rapids, Michigan. 

HERNÁN: Yeah, so what happened was that I was traveling with my friend David, and then he ended up taking me to these remote place called Grand Rapids. I mean, remote to me. It was just like, In Michigan, up north, super far away from what I had left where I had departed initially. But the idea was to meet his longtime friend and traveler Jonathan, who at the time was happening to be driving through. 

GONZÁLEZ: Hernán goes to a bar with his friend in Grand Rapids to meet this guy, Jonathan, who’s passing through from Rhode Island. And something cosmic happens.

HERNÁN: I saw him at the bar across a table. Just the way that I saw him —the baseball cap turned backwards, and his hair coming out kind of curly and his beard and his eyes, and there was just something that shone straight at me—I think made me really fall for him.

NUNES: Hernán, David and Jonathan travel together for the next week across the American West. They camp under the stars in Utah and see the deserts of Nevada. They travel all the way to San Francisco. And by the end of the trip, Hernán and Jonathan are in love. 

GONZÁLEZ: They have to part ways in San Francisco because Hernán has arranged to stay with a friend in Seattle, but Jonathan decides to join him there in a few days. And they wind up finding a place to stay together. For the first time in the years since he came out to his father and left his home, Hernán has a place to stay with someone he loves. But then: HERNÁN: It came the time when my tourist visa was ending. So I was given three months. I tried to enroll as a student in a community college. But my student visa was rejected. So instead of staying in the US, without regular papers, I decided to go to Argentina and try to figure things out there.

NUNES: After years running away from Argentina and all the heartbreak and rejection Hernán experienced there, he goes back to his homeland so that he can commit to his life with Jonathan. 

GONZÁLEZ: Yeah, it’s a really courageous thing, I think, for Hernan to try to immigrate legally into the US to be with this person who is giving him that connection and home he literally crossed the world to find. 

NUNES: But it’s not easy. Hernán’s US visa gets denied. So, he goes with plan B. 

HERNÁN: I ended up applying to a university in Vancouver. And, right away, I was admitted.

GONZÁLEZ: It’s a genius little work around. Vancouver is only a 3-hour drive from Seattle, where Jonathan is. Hernán gets a scholarship to study art, so he can make more of a career. And now, there’s just one more legal hurdle Hernán has to jump through to be with Jonathan forever. 

HERNÁN: The reason why we couldn't be together was because DOMA , at that time, was in effect.

NUNES: DOMA, or the Defense of Marriage Act, is a US federal law from 1996 that allows states to refuse to recognize same-sex marriages and all the legal protections couples can get through marriage. 

GONZÁLEZ: Which includes the green card sponsorship that a person with US citizenship can give their non-citizen fiance. It’s 2013, though. And the Supreme Court is actually in the process of reviewing DOMA. 

HERNÁN: We waited it out, basically. And DOMA became unconstitutional. And we were able to file papers so that I could come to the United States as a fiance. And that same year, we got married in Massachusetts.

GONZÁLEZ: It’s 2015 now, and Hernán and Jonathan move to Providence. Jonathan’s family is from Massachusetts, and he works in the restaurant business in Providence. 

NUNES: They set up shop on Wickenden Street. And for the first time since he graduated from high school, Hernán isn’t alone, and he stops travelling. 

HERNÁN: Well, I took the first two years to invest, invest sounds so pretentious, to just do art. Really, that's what I was doing. And after that, I started working with the city of Providence to organize the music and art festival, PVD Fest, and that eventually also ended up structuring my practice as a creative producer and artist, which is pretty much where you are finding me today.

GONZÁLEZ: Hernán says “pretty much” because he’s still growing as an artist, still bringing people together through conversation and music, still living on Wickenden Street, but he’s no longer with Jonathan. 

HERNÁN: We just ended up going different ways after years of being together...um…

GONZÁLEZ: And he doesn’t say much more than this. I can tell the hurt is still too new to talk about. And Hernán is back to being alone.

NUNES: But that doesn’t change the fact that all of this travel and adventure and soul-searching has helped Hernán find meaning and a home in the US. The loneliness has a purpose. 

GONZÁLEZ: You’re right. And Hernán has new reasons to stay in the US. It’s not for the love of a person anymore or for the need to get away from it all. 

HERNÁN: Well, I'm driven by the same desire that put me on a hitchhiking trip 10 years ago, but it’s the desire of following my true innermost impulses and also finding the resources to make them happen. I think that I don't know any other language other than art making that can bring the best out of me. So that's why I keep doing it.

GONZÁLEZ: And is the United States where you want to keep doing that? Like, do you see a future for yourself here? 

HERNÁN: For me, it's important to bring my experiences as someone from Latin America to the United States to share what I had gone through. And to learn more about the cultures here in order to also understand the relationships between the United States and the rest of the Americas. Deepening that mutual understanding, I think, is critical if we are to know peace as a continent.

GONZÁLEZ: As someone who has seen so much of the beauty and turmoil of the Americas, Hernán wants to stay here, in Rhode Island, to keep learning about the US se he can grow as an artist. For now, it’s home.

HERNÁN: Yeah, yeah. I'm just gonna try to find the best if I do this. Yeah, whatever. Whatever is comfortable. So yeah, let me see. I was trying to do. I was trying to use this. [TAMBOURINE SOUNDS]

GONZÁLEZ: Very Bob Dylan of you.

HERNÁN: Oh is it? I didn’t even think about it. But it adds a nice tone to it. But I do want to say that I wrote the song actually here on Wickenden street after the trip. And the song is called “América.”

GONZÁLEZ: The lyrics are about gazing out an open window and looking south, towards his first home. He sees the blue sky, and the trees, wet with rain.

GONZÁLEZ: Then, the lyrics turn more inward. They describe a family and a home that HERNÁN felt like he had to escape, but, he knows, ultimately, he’ll go back.

NUNES: Mosaic is a production of The Public’s Radio, edited by Sally Eisele with production help from James Baumgartner and Aaron Selbig. Our original music is by Bryn Bliska. Additional music this episode by Hernán Jourdan. Torey Malatia is the general manager of The Public’s Radio. I’m Alex Nunes.

GONZÁLEZ: And I’m Ana Gonzalez. Thanks for listening to Mosaic! If you've enjoyed the stories you've heard over the last few months, we'd like to ask you for a small favor: Share this podcast with someone you know. You can tweet about it, post it to Facebook, or email your family with a link. We'd like for as many people as possible to hear about Mosaic, and we know that when you share it with friends, that can make a big difference. You can share it from your podcast app, or find all the links at thepublicsradio.org/mosaic. Thanks!