Gisela Fagundo

Born on 18 May 1937
Died on 19 March 2024

Catawba, NC. Gisela Maria Virginia Fagundo, 86, passed away peacefully in her sleep on March 19, 2024, while in hospice care in Catawba, North Carolina. Her family is filled with melancholy and relief that she has finally been freed from her diabetes and its limitations.

Gisela was born in the capital city of Cuba, in east Havana, the eldest daughter of loving parents, Rafael Mora Adelit and Gisela Alejandrina Céspedes Latapier, to whom she was very attached and loyal. While she was carefree as a child, often riding her white-rimmed wheel bike, shopping at the fanciest boutiques with her doting aunt, Coralia Céspedes de Bernal, grooving to the Hit Parade in the late forties and, in the early fifties, swooning to Tropicana stars such as Josephine Baker and Roland Gerbaud, Giselita, as she was then called, was also a hard-working, go-get-it, self-assured, resolute and highly independent student. She finished high school two years in advance of her peers receiving her diploma in grand style from her grandfather, Miguel Angel Céspedes, at the time, Minister of Education in Cuba. She then commenced studies at the University of Havana in Education following in the footsteps of her mother and aunt, both holders of doctoral degrees in Education. However, after only a couple of years of concerted study, she switched disciplines to social work at the encouragement of her lifelong friend, Nisia Agüero, and forged her own path in the family, never again to look back. She received her master’s degree in social work in short order and made a 40-year career of her passion, taking care of others, by working as a medical social worker and specializing in gerontology.

On September 5, 1960, she wed her devoted husband, Carlos Emilio Gregorio Fagundo Piedra, after a three-year courtship. In 1965, she, then a mother of three and a fierce ballast against the revolutionary winds swirling in Cuba, endured great hardship as her husband, an anti-Castroist magistrate Judge, was forced to renounce his post and sent off to back-breaking labor camps. Under the auspices of a refugee program put in place by President Lyndon Johnson, Gisela and Carlos made the momentous decision in 1969 to leave behind everything they possessed and emigrate to the United States. With the generous sponsorship of cousins already living in the U.S., the family arrived in Bridgeport, Connecticut and less than a year later settled in northern Virginia to raise their young family.

She worked full-time for many years at the Arlington Hospital and later for the Fairfax Country Department of Health to the admiration of her co-workers, patients, and clients alike. While she was never much fond of the paperwork, she was dogged in resolving issues and showing care for every person with which she came into contact.

Gisela was gifted with an easy smile that on magical occasions would give way to insuppressible peals of laughter difficult to control or resist. She liked singing and spending quality time with her husband traveling, dancing, or attending concerts at the Wolf Trap Filene Center. She surely offered her children all the love and support they needed. Catholic school education? Check. Summer league swim club memberships? Check. Indeed, she would have been an apt model for a mother-bear poster campaign if such were ever needed. Heaven help the person who looked askance at or said anything critical against any one of her children! That beautiful smile could quickly harden to reveal that same clear-eyed, resolute countenance she had to exhibit throughout her life and would make any untoward situation very clear: “Don’t mess with my children!” Indeed, she scantly flinched upon once taking on one of the nuns in her youngest child’s elementary school after the nun might had gone too far berating him. She always had her children’s back.

She also always took pride in taking care of herself, her home, and her cooking. Indeed, one of the ways she showed her love for her family was through food. Gisela was a master cook and loved to entertain and present tasty, nourishing meals to family and friends alike. Paella, flan, ‘million dollar’ pie, bread and rice puddings, black beans and rice, roasted pork, picadillo and a panoply of stews were just a few of her signature dishes that comforted the soul and stomach of those who had the pleasure of partaking. After her retirement in 2005, she took on for many years the duties of Hospitality Coordinator at her church, New World Unity in Springfield, VA, where, by her food, she was considered a matriarch of their hospitality and fellowship program. Gisela Maria Virginia Fagundo will be missed by all those who had the pleasure of knowing her.

Preceded in death by her husband, Carlos Emilio Gregorio Fagundo in 1992; she is survived by her younger sister, Moraima Céspedes and her husband, Alberto, in Havana, Cuba; her three children, Esperanza Boyles and her husband, Ron, of Catawba, NC, Carlos Fagundo of Pacific Grove, CA and Rafael Fagundo and his wife, Mojee Shokri, of Miami, FL; as well as her ex-daughter-in-law, Cristal Fagundo of Charlotte, NC; and her precious two grandchildren, Ashley Fagundo and Rafael Fagundo Jr. and his wife, Ally, of Chesapeake, VA and Charlotte, NC, respectively.

A private family Celebration of Life will occur in May.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be sent to the American Diabetes Association in her honor.

Please sign the online guestbook at www.caringcremations.net. The Fagundo family has entrusted arrangements to Caring Cremations Life Celebrations and Funerals at 828-855-3350.