Uruguayan couple of 40 years visited Miami to see family. They died in Surfside collapse
A week after Champlain Towers South collapsed, Bernardo Camou resolved to travel from Uruguay to Surfside. After days of waiting for news, he wanted to be close to his missing older sister, Maria Gabriela Camou, and her spouse, Miguel Kaufmann, as first responders searched for them in the rubble.
“I couldn’t stay here with my arms crossed. It was then that I made the determination to go there,” said Bernardo, who flew to Miami along with his elder sibling, María Inés.
The pair decorated the memorial wall on Harding Avenue, tying a Uruguayan flag — blue-and-white stripes and a golden sun — to the chain-link fence. A waterfall of pale pink roses, white baby’s breath and dark green leaves framed photographs of Gabriela and Miguel. In one image, the couple smiles from the church pews of a niece’s wedding. In a black-and-white shot, a young Gabriela beams between a horse’s ears. A yellow handwritten note with “GABRIELA” in black lettering at the top is attached to the flag.
Gabriela Camou, 64, and Miguel Kaufmann, 65, visited Miami about three times a year from their native Uruguay to see their son, his wife, and two grandchildren who live in South Florida. They often stayed for long stretches of time in the city.
But the married couple disappeared in the darkness and rubble when their Champlain Towers South condo collapsed on June 24. Gabriela was recovered on July 8. Her husband, Miguel, was found a day later.
Maria Gabriela Camou was born on May 19, 1957, to Jorge Camou Jerónima and Maria Inés Font Sarasola, according to genealogical records. She had three other siblings: Mauricio, Maria Inés, and Bernardo. Mauricio, the eldest brother, died in an aircraft accident decades ago.
She grew up in Montevideo, the coastal capital of Uruguay, and attended the Colegio Jesus María, where she was taught by nuns. She finished her high school years at an Italian school in the city.
In the summers and winters, Gabriela and her siblings spent holidays in the family’s country home. She was a skilled rider, Bernardo recalled, and rode horses in the picturesque rural landscapes. Sometimes, the family would go to Punta del Este, one of Uruguay’s most famous seaside cities on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean.
Bernardo described his sibling as timid, quiet and introverted, the result of being a middle child whose eldest sister was an accomplished dancer.
“Gabriela was a very pretty girl. She did almost all things right,” said Bernardo, adding that her middle child status shaped her identity and personality.
After finishing high school, she took a secretarial course and started working as an administrative assistant. That’s how she met her future husband, Miguel Leonardo Kaufmann, a hardworking businessman who had lost his father in adolescence.
“He took on his shoulders the responsibility of supporting his family, his mother and his brother,” said Bernardo. “And he had to start adult life, being 16 years old, without having finished his studies.”
But his brother-in-law was hardworking, sharp, and intelligent, and made his career through different enterprises. At one point, he owned land and grew silvery eucalyptus trees. He bought and managed parking lots in coveted city spaces. He was also a great conversationalist who could speak to any topic, said Bernardo.
“He had very firm and very determined ideas,” he said.
After about two years of dating, the young couple married. Gabriela was Christian and Miguel was Jewish. A priest and a rabbi blessed the beginning of their marriage.
Miguel and Gabriela had three children together: Mauricio, Sofia, and Bruno. The couple brought them up in Christianity and Judaism, giving them space to follow the religious beliefs that most resonated with them. They invited family and friends over for birthday parties and play dates in the house they built together.
After having children, Gabriela became a stay-at-home mom who was dedicated to her kids. She, along with her husband, encouraged them to pursue their studies and to find professional and educational opportunities outside of Uruguay.
Gabriela and Miguel were members of the Nautilus Yachting Club, a water sports club in Montevideo, and sometimes cycled around the city. She danced ballet and made a fantastic apple strudel. She always visited others’ homes with a cake or dessert in hand and took long walks around Carrasco, a seaside barrio. Bernardo sometimes came over to swim in the pool and talk.
“Most of the time she greeted me with a big smile from ear to ear,” he said. ”She showed me with a smile that she loved me, that I was important to her. It was like she caressed my soul.”
Miguel and Gabriela got along well, he said, and had been married for 40 years when Champlain Towers collapsed. The couple had recently moved to a seafront apartment in Punta Carretas, another seaside neighborhood in the south of the capital city filled with condominiums with ocean views, he added.
Gabriela spoke daily with their children, spread between the United States and Europe. She deeply missed her three children and five grandchildren.
Bernardo visited the memorial in Surfside almost every day of his visit, bringing fresh flowers to place by the photographs of his sister and her husband. Before traveling back, he bought two rosaries at St. Joseph Catholic Church —which lost congregants in the collapse. One he tied to the memorial.
“And I have one,” he said, pulling the rosary out of his breast pocket at his home in Uruguay.
“She was a great, wonderful person outside and inside. She was beautiful, divine and I miss her,” he said.
Gabriela Camou and Miguel Kaufmann were buried together, side-by-side, in the same way they slept for 40 years.
