"Leaving Cuba affected my father tremendously," recalls Kiki Berger, now 48, founder of Cuban Crafters, Inc., who is in ill health and has to undergo dialysis several times a week. "He'd run away from Europe and was living a comfortable life in Cuba, and all of a sudden he had to leave everything he had and come to the U.S. and start all over again."

What the elder Berger brought with him to the United States and his new life was a passion for making cigars that he passed down to Kiki, now head of a Miami-based cigar company that manufactures and distributes cigars hand-crafted in the company's factory in Estelí, Nicaragua, about 65 miles north of the nation's capital, Managua.

With the exception of wrappers, Cuban Crafters cigars are almost exclusively fashioned from tobacco grown on Berger's 200-acre farm Vegas de Tabacalera Estelí - about five miles north of Estelí - or on a smaller, 60-acre spread in Jalapa, three hours north near the Honduran border. Like many youngsters whose families have longstanding cigar traditions, Berger began working with tobacco with his father as a teenager. He later struck out on his own to work with other cigar masters and eventually established his own identity in the cigar world. Cuban Crafters manufactures Cuban Crafters Original, with Ecuadorian-grown Habana 2000 or Cameroon wrapper; La Carolina, which Berger's factory previously made under the brand name Cupido for another company; Don Kiki in Red, Brown, Green, and White labels, featuring different blends; C.E. Beck y Cia with Cameroon wrappers; the limited-edition Premium Vegas de Estelí robusto and toro lines; J.L Salazar y Hermanos, named for one of Berger's Cuban Crafters partners whose family still works a farm in Cuba; and short-filler 420s. The Don Kiki White Vintage Limited Edition is particularly notable, as it is a Nicaraguan puro featuring Nicaraguan filler and binder grown on Berger's farm with the best wrapper available at the end of the season, either Habana 2000, Habana Criollo, or Connecticut shade.

When veteran Smoke writer Bob Ashley spoke in late May to Berger, who suffers from kidney disease, the veteran cigar master was waiting for a transplant.

BERGER: Three times a week - one day in, one day out. I have it done here in the United States, and I helped put a dialysis clinic in Estelí in 2004. The hospital there didn't have a dialysis machine and the drive to Managua was too long. Now there are 14 patients - including myself - using the center in Estelí. We also created a little fund for people in the community who couldn't afford dialysis. All they have to pay for is the filters.

SMOKE: You grew up in Cuba, and you were about 10 when you left. What do you remember about your youth there?

BERGER: I grew up in a town called Victoria de Las Tuna in the Oriente region on the south side of the island. My father was originally from Poland and my mother was from Romania. My grandfather and one of his older sons used to work on a ship and go from Poland to Cuba. He used to buy 50 to 100 boxes of cigars from a Cuban guy and he'd sell them in Poland.

When World War II started, the Nazis killed almost my whole family. My father and his brother escaped from Europe on the ship that my uncle worked on. They were in a concentration camp, but they escaped. They were just kids - in their teens. My grandfather's brother hid my father and took him to Cuba, where the only person they knew was the owner of the cigar factory where my uncle bought cigars. He put my father to work in a factory in the Victoria de Tuna region. It was a small factory. The cigars were unlabeled, and they were sold locally.

Later, my father became a partner in the factory. When the original owner died, my father was left with the business. I was born after that and I grew up around cigars.

SMOKE: What were the circumstances when the family left Cuba?

BERGER: We didn't have to flee, but I would have had to go into the Army within a few years. [The government] let us go because they got all the property we had - the farm, the houses and the equipment. They wanted to give all of that to the Russians, who were just coming into Cuba. The Cuban authorities said [my father] could leave, but he had to give up his property.

SMOKE: Did the departure go smoothly?

BERGER: I will never forget that when we got to the Havana airport my father looked at me and said that all he was leaving Cuba with was his marriage band, a cigar he had in his mouth, and two cigars that he had in his pocket.

Well, one of the immigration officials took his wedding band from him, and as we went through the airport two other people asked if they could have a cigar, and he gave them each one. He turned to me and said, "Remember I said to you that all I had to take out of Cuba was my marriage band and two cigars. Now, I don't even have those."

SMOKE: Have you been back?

BERGER: No, I've never been back. I'd love to go back, but I will never go back until Fidel is not there.

SMOKE: You became a cigar roller at an early age.

BERGER: Yes. In Miami my father and I would roll them and my mother would package them. He worked out of our garage for a while. We used to just make cigars without labels and names. But if you were doctor so-and-so, we'd make a cigar and put a label on it. We had lots of doctors and lawyers who bought our cigars.

SMOKE: Your family was making cigars in Miami. How did the operation end up in Nicaragua?

BERGER: During the cigar boom, because of the price of tobacco, there was a shortage of good tobacco. Before my father died in 1994 he said I should try going to Nicaragua. He said I would find good tobacco there. He described Nicaraguan tobacco as being almost the same as Cuban tobacco because the Cubans had given the Sandinista government Cuban tobacco seed to grow. I was approached by a group of friends who started a company called World Cigars. I went to Nicaragua and began to make 5 Vegas cigars [pronounced "cinco vegas'' and now manufactured by another company], which became popular. When our financier passed away, the whole thing fell apart.

SMOKE: But you continued to make cigars in Nicaragua?

BERGER: After World Cigars ended, I had no choice but to open my own business. I was already in Nicaragua and I started making cigars for Cupido, and I became a private label manufacturer for other companies, most of which have disappeared. I started making my own cigars in 1998 and that's when Cuban Crafters was born. We make about 10,000 cigars a day now and I employ about 200 people - between 75 and 100 of them are rollers. I've tried my best to keep my old rollers who have been with me since day one.

SMOKE: You still live in Miami. How often do you get to Nicaragua?

BERGER: Every month I am there for a week or a week-and-a-half. In April, I spent the whole month there. Sometimes I'll fly in for a week and sometimes I come back to Miami for my health.

SMOKE: Why grow tobacco and make cigars in Nicaragua?

BERGER: It's not just Nicaragua; it's the Estelí area. The volcanic ground is very thick and dark, so you get this flavor that is sweet and strong. A lot of people want to make cigars very strong but they forget about taste. My cigars have full body, but they also have taste. Just making it strong is not enough. I learned that from my friend [cigar maker] Orlando Padrón, and I learned that from my father. When people try to copy Padrón [cigars], they make the mistake of making a strong cigar without any flavor. That's the difference between me and other manufacturers. They want to make a cigar that knocks you on your behind, but that's not good. You have to give character to a cigar. The tobacco in all Cuban Crafters cigars comes from our own farms, with the exception of the wrapper in some cases.

SMOKE: What are your thoughts about the cigar industry currently?