CAMBRIDGE – Manny Lopes, the Executive Vice President of Public Markets and Government Relations for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, said his childhood experiences as the son of Cape Verdean immigrants living in East Boston not only helped shape his approach to life but also his career path.
While accepting the 2023 Massachusetts Alliance of Portuguese Speakers (MAPS) Person of the Year Award on April 22, Lopes shared some of those fond memories with more than 400 community leaders, entrepreneurs, public officials and MAPS staff and volunteers gathered at the nonprofit organization’s Awards Gala in Cambridge.
“Growing up, I had relatives in Angola, a country that was in the midst of what would be a brutal 26-year-long civil war,” he recalled. “My mother worked for years to bring my relatives here. When she finally passed the U.S. citizenship test, our lives changed dramatically. Our family in Angola were now our roommates. We went from being a family of five in a one-bedroom apartment to a family of 22 in the same one-bedroom apartment. This meant we each had a role to play for our family.”
