DNA Test
Detroit was the 4th city I visited during my USA trip. This is another city that I knew very little about, if not the city that I knew the least about! People kept asking me why I chose Detroit and I was constantly told that there is nothing to do there, and that it has become a ghost town. The reason for this was simple. It turned out that I have family in Detroit and I wanted to visit them! Two years ago I took a DNA test from Ancestry.com. To be honest, I only wanted to find out more about my own origin. I have always been told that I look too “dark” to be fully Polish. Therefore, ever since I was a child, I wanted to find out the reason for this. Because of my huge interest in foreign cultures, I was excited to learn that there finally was a tool that could help me reveal my possible exotic roots. My DNA test results came out rather disappointing; it turned out I was 99 % Eastern European (Polish) and 1 % Finish or Northern Russian! However, there was a good thing about this test too, and that was all the DNA matches! Honestly, I had no expectations about finding any matches at all! DNA testing in Poland is not too common yet: it is quite expensive and Poles living in Poland are often familiar with their extended families. As I was born in Norway, this was not the case for me and I found this whole DNA test thing very exciting. It turned out I had 18 000 matches! Of course, most of them were very distant family members, so I only contacted the 3rd and 4th cousins. I was very surprised to learn how many of them lived in Michigan. In a later post, I will write more about the whole DNA test process. For now, I will try to make the story short. After finding the exact connection with some of my matches, I decided to finally visit them! And I am so happy I decided to do so. I had an amazing time! It was so incredible to finally meet them, and to get to know them!
Arriving in Detroit
On the first day, I was pretty exhausted after the overnight flight from Seattle to Detroit. The flight was at 11 PM, and it took about 4 hours. Luckily, I usually have no problems sleeping on planes! But of course, it is not the best quality of sleep. Because of the 2 hour time difference between Seattle and Detroit, I landed at at 6 AM. The flight was completely full, and I was quite surprised about the low amount of people leaving the airport in Detroit. I assume the rest had a connecting flight to another city. This made me question whether this city really has become a ghost town!
My cousin Jim, picked me up at the airport and I stayed with him and his wife for 4 very lovely days. It was quite a long drive from the airport to Sterling Heights (a small city right outside of Detroit). I was too exhausted to enjoy the views, but what caught my attention was how green and flat it was here. Another thing was the bad quality of the roads! I had already learned that the nature is very different from state to state, something that is not so strange as the United States is of the same size as the whole Europe! As much as Seattle reminded me of Norway, Detroit reminded me of Poland! By this I mainly mean the nature, some of the architecture and the roads! Although the roads in Poland have greatly improved in the past couple of years, here it seems like there has not been any improvement for ages.
We finally reached the house in Sterling Heights where Jim’s wife was already up waiting for us. Upon arrival I was met with a big “Welcome Anyah” sign. How cute is that!? I don’t think I have ever been greeted in such a warm and hospitable way as I was here. The house reminded me of ours in Norway. In the garden, there were plenty of squirrels stealing apples, and it was the first time that I saw a black squirrel! I did not even know those existed. I started the day with a nap. Later that day, we were going to have guests over, so I wanted to be a little rested. The other guests that visited us were 2 other cousins; the brother and sister of Jim and their partners. I found it incredible that they were so excited to meet me, and although this was the first time we met, I felt we had a special connection. As already mentioned, never before have I ever felt this warmly welcomed.
Lexington at Lake Huron
Everyday, my cousins organised trips and activities for us to assure that I would enjoy my stay to the fullest. One of the days, we drove all the way up to Lexington, a tiny, very charming village by Lake Huron. Lake Huron is such a huge lake that it almost looks like the ocean. We were very lucky with the weather and we even had the chance to relax a bit on the beach. Although most of the shops were closed, probably because it was a weekday and the summer had just ended, it was really nice to go for a walk in the very charming centre of Lexington. It is hard to explain the unique atmosphere with words, but let’s say that it no longer felt like being in the USA. The houses were so cute that the whole village resembled a fairytale wonderland. And of course, we had a lunch break at an American diner where I ate the first coney dog of my entire life… It may not look that good on the picture, but believe me, it was!
Downtown Detroit and Belle Isle Park
The next day, we drove to Detroit city. We started by going to the Belle Isle park. The view from there over the Detroit skyline is breathtaking. Again, some of the activities were closed, but luckily the beautiful botanical garden was open. After visiting Belle Isle Park, we drove further into Downtown Detroit. I was positively surprised by this city as it looked pretty neat and modern. Completely not how I had imagined it after hearing all the negative descriptions and the stories about it being ghost town! We also went to the eastern market, which is a pretty cool area, with lots of interesting market like shops and a lot of amazing street art on every corner!
Detroit: A Ghost Town?
Regarding the ghost town part… well, here it comes. After visiting downtown Detroit, we drove to some other areas, because my cousins wanted to show me the neighbourhood in which they grew up, and also my great-grandfather’s sister’s house. To me, it was a very special experience to get the chance to see this. However, it was also very frightening to see what these neighbourhoods and areas had become! This was when I first realised that Detroit (or a part of it) had indeed become a ghost town. We drove through so many neighbourhoods where all the houses were completely empty! Churches, schools, everything was demolished. It was an unbelievable sight, especially since you could really tell that these neighbourhoods used to be very pretty! Why did people move out from these neighbourhoods and why isn’t anyone putting effort in buying the houses to renovate them? Why isn’t anyone willing to give back life to these beautiful neighbourhoods!? It was so sad to see that the wonderful childhood homes of my cousins were completely abandoned! It really was like a horror movie. And believe me, I am not only talking about one neighbourhood; there were so many of them as we were driving!
My great-grandfather’s sister’s house!
Hamtramck
After this shocking experience, we drove to Hamtramck. Hamtramck is an international district with lots of foreign shops. Apparently, it used to be a Polish district, but it has now more of an Arabian feel to it. However, there are still some Polish shops present which we obviously had to visit. It was funny to see all the Polish stuff they have. To be honest, I haven’t even seen that much Polish stuff in Poland!
Meeting Alexis in Royal Oak
In the evening, I was picked up by a friend of mine (Alexis) with whom I studied in the Netherlands (and with whom I even went to Rwanda with!). I mean, how coincidental is it that she lives like 20 minutes away from my “new” family? It was so fun to see her again. I promised her I would come visit her (even before I knew I had family living in Michigan), and here I was. We went for some really good tacos at a Mexican Restaurant in Royal Oak. Oh by the way, what a cool and lively city Royal Oak is! You can tell that this is a city were a lot of young people live. It was full of bars and restaurants, and everything was completely full! Even on a weekday! In fact, we could not even find a table anywhere, so we had to eat by the bar. Seeing her was a lot of fun. This was another example of feeling like no time had passed since the last time I saw a friend. Well, it hadn’t passed 8 years like with the other friends I had met during this trip, but still, it for sure did not feel like more than a year had passed since the last time we saw each other in the Netherlands!
The Tom Ford Museum with Bill
On my last day in the Detroit area, I was picked up by another cousin, Bill. Bill’s daughter lives in England and he was initially not going to be home in Detroit during the time of my visit. However, when he heard I was coming to Detroit, he changed his ticket and returned to Detroit a few days earlier just to get the opportunity to meet me for one day! He picked me up in his red convertible and we drove to the Tom Ford museum. Although I am not a “museum person”, I must admit that this museum really is worth a visit! In fact, I think this is the museum that I have enjoyed the most in my entire life! The exhibition consisted of everything from Presidential cars (including the car in which John F Kennedy was shot!); the chair in which Abraham Lincoln was shot; the bus that Rosa Parks was arrested on; the first airplanes to fly around the world; the first McDonald sign; everything is collected here! Do definitely visit this museum if you go to Detroit!
Grosse Pointe
We also wanted to visit the Motown museum, but in the end the time did not allow us to do so. This is because we later that day were going to another cousin for a huge family dinner with even more cousins! But Bill told me some very interesting stories from the Motown time, in fact, he went to school with Diana Ross! Before driving back home to Jim, we drove through Grosse Pointe, which is were Bill lived most of his life (and also where we later were going for that family party to my other cousin). Now that is a beautiful neighbourhood! You can really tell it is very upscale. The houses were breathtaking! I personally have only seen these types of homes on TV. They differ from the homes in, for instance LA, because of the architecture: they all look traditional and are constructed of bricks. Not that I have anything against the LA homes, I’d certainly take both.
Family Dinner
At 6 o’clock, Jim, his wife and I were already on our way back to Grosse Pointe. As already mentioned, one of my other cousin’s lives there (Jim’s sister), and she hosted the dinner party where I in total would meet 21 family members! It is really touching that so many people showed up to meet me. And of course, because of our background, there was loads of Polish food! My cousin ordered catering from a very good Polish restaurant. I must admit, most of the food tasted just like in Poland, except from a few dishes that I was unfamiliar with, such as City Chicken. The pierogi were also a bit different, but regardless of that, everything was delicious!
Everyone was so welcoming, and I am so happy to have become a part of their family and to have them in my life. I can’t wait to meet them again and to also meet the rest of my cousins that were unable to attend. They were all such loving and hospitable people, and I really consider myself so lucky to be related to them! Words can’t explain how sad it was to leave Detroit.
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Anyah Mroz 