From exile to the promised land of New Haven

His relocation from San Francisco to Europe, Africa, and finally the Caribbean might account for Santiago Mosten's, CC '04, exotic looks and soft-spoken eloquence.

COURTESY SANTIAGO Mosten Santiago Mosten, CC '04, has grown up all over the world and is a member of the royal family of England.

His father hails from New Jersey, while his mother is a descendant of British aristocracy. A progressive socialist, she broke away from British society and moved to San Francisco, where she met his father, who is African-American. Five months after Mosten was born, he and his family moved to Grenada, which at that time had a socialist government headed by Maurice Bishop.

"For whatever reason, they did not want me growing up in the United States," Mosten said. "They did not like the society that was U.S. society and decided to remove themselves from it."

In Grenada, Mosten's parents taught in schools and "worked with the people, doing community service and whatnot." A few months later, however, the U.S. government evacuated Mosten and his family after it deemed the country dangerous.

"Under the pretense of protecting foreign citizens, the U.S. Army came to Grenada in 1982 and bombed the country," Mosten explained. "My mom, dad, and I were arrested and taken from our home, and we couldn't take anything with us. My mom was carrying me."

After landing at a North Carolina airfield, Mosten said he and his parents "eventually found [their] way to England" and remained in the country as refugees for a few months. Mosten then moved to Spain and attended kindergarten in Barcelona.

Mosten said his parents were forced to separate soon after. "My mother could not go back to the United States because of her British passport," he said. "So my parents went their separate ways." His father went back to San Francisco, while Mosten himself moved to Zimbabwe with his mother when he was about three years old. He lived in the country for six years.

There, his mother took a government job teaching trade skills to people from a small village in central Zimbabwe while he attended a nearby British boarding school. At the time, Mosten learned Shona, the local dialect, and said he "often translated for my mother because she could not pick it up as fast."

In Africa, Mosten and his mother traversed the continent and its surrounding islands, including Mauritius. We traveled a lot," he said. "It came to a point where I had to get my passport renewed because it ran on too many pages with stamps from different countries."

"In Zanzibar, we stayed on a tiny island," Mosten said. "You could walk around the whole island in 10 minutes."

He also recalls the time he suffered from food poisoning while mountain-climbing in Lesotho when he was four years old. "We were about 500 miles from civilization and 100 miles from the coast. We were in a hut and my mom was scared," he said. "A couple of foreigners happened to pass through, and they took us to a nearby hospital, where I stayed for a week to recover."

Mosten and his mother later moved to Trinidad, where they have lived ever since. He says he and his mother are very close. "My mother has been a very big part of my life, whether for good or for bad."

One thing Mosten misses about his home in Trinidad is his garden, complete with mango trees and starfruit. "Two times a day, green parrots come and start squawking and eating our fruit," he said.

Because of his heritage, Mosten, who took his mother's surname, shares lineage with the British royal family and has recorded history dating back to the 12th century.

Mosten attended an all-boys Catholic school for seven years in Trinidad. "It was very taboo to be anything out of the ordinary there," he said. "Diversity was shunned."

Living in different places has widened Mosten's perspective on life, allowing him to become independent. Moving a lot, he said, "gives you a very precious sense of objectivity that you can use to approach everything in life. It is healthy to not be stuck in a rut of cultural opinion."

"Because of the life I lived, there have been a lot of opportunities I have not had access to, but I would not give up what I have experienced," he said.

Mosten decided to matriculate at an American college because he wants to keep his career options open. "I wanted to have the chance to explore and get a feel for what I want to do in life," he said.

He currently takes courses in French and environmental studies, as well as a graphic design seminar. "Many in my family are artists," he said.

"I never got to pursue art as much as I wanted to," he said. Though he is a member of the varsity squash team and the club soccer team, Mosten maintains that "Yale takes some getting used to."

Back to News...