Tolstoy stated: The Anarchist are right in everything; in the negation of the existing order, and in the assertion that, without Authority, there could not be worse violence than that of Authority under existing conditions. They are mistaken only in thinking that Anarchy can be instituted by a revolution. But it will be instituted only by there being more and more people who do not require the protection of power… there can be only one permanent revolution – a moral one: the regeneration of the inner man.
It’s the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall.
How could anyone in the past predict where the city would be today, in their future and post being ground zero for the second world war, the peak of the cold war and the capitulation of communism?
I’ve been on the DNA trek for over 3 months now. After an extended journey through Italy, Sweden, Scotland and a quick pass through London and Amsterdam, I have landed here: Berlin.
Outside of the Mitte, in the baby making capital of Germany, in the trendy Prenzlauer Berg neighborhood, I have focused the last few weeks on getting this website together so that I may begin sharing my past and future travel diaries, to start the discussion.
This is just the beginning, a superficial scratch of the surface to a deep unknown. Similar to the rebuilding of this beautiful, nature and culturally-rich, very satisfying city; there is still much work to do, goals to reach.
Before I headed off for my DNA trek, a professional from the association of genealogists helped me trace what’s in this blood of mine. She’s great, an enthusiastic expert who likes the project and comes with a PhD in this exact field. Curiously focused on immigration, migration (19th/20th centuries), with a lot of accumulated knowledge.
We started with my Mother. She was 50/50 Italian and Swedish. We went back as far as we could, within a reasonable budget, and were surprised to find interesting facts about my Great Great Grandparents, which I’ll share later.
The second phase was the paternal side, which was more difficult for a few personal reasons, because there was little contact between my Father, his family and myself. Plus his bloodline goes farther back, to the founding of the United States, whereas my Mother’s parents were first and/or second generation. But after some digging we reached a good outcome, finding information of relatives from: Scotland, Germany, France and Israel.
It should be understood, even with this pre-trek planning — this was a blind-jump, a leap of faith.
I don’t have much planned on a monthly, to weekly, and sometimes daily basis — and there’s still an unknown amount of information and area to cover, both in terms of travel and research.
One of the most important parts of my DNA trek is to see where the world takes me, instinctively. It’s been amazing to see how well that works. Though I do have an idea, a general map of countries and hometowns to visit. I am making a point to roam, as past relatives obviously did, to explore beyond the idea of home.
Where did my ancestors come from? What shaped their lives?
Like many people who have families based in the United States, my “roots” can be found in Europe. It could be said I’m about as Western or Eurocentric as it gets. But that broad statement delivers just a small piece of a greater truth, wouldn’t you agree? Because where did my European “roots” come from?
I decided to take a DNA test which would help me understand my deeper origins.
The Genographic Project, related to FamilyTreeDNA.com, is the same organization with which I took my own DNA test. They can trace only 1% of the genome that is not shuffled – mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) through the maternal line and the Y-chromosome through the paternal.
From this test I discovered that my DNA bloodline reaches back 40,000 years.
Just as Aristotle fit nature into categories, so have scientists with our DNA, called haplogroups. I am in the H6a1a category, one of the oldest haplogroup branches. And one of the most frequent branches found among Arabian lineage, and surprisingly discovered in very low frequencies in Europe (although I share the same DNA group with Paglicci 23, the name for the 28,000-year-old human remains found in a cave in Apulia, Italy).
Around 50,000 years ago, a small band of maritime humans made their way from South East Africa across the Red Sea at the narrow of the Bab el-Mandeb, or Gate of Tears; the point where we all branched off heading for all points of the Earth. The H6a1a branch of people, from what I understand today, stayed in what we now consider the Middle East, though a rare and likely small group went elsewhere.
My traceable DNA; my exploring and expanding ancestors, eventually became settled in areas we know now as Northern Europe around 20,000 years ago. For my own discovery, I decided to take the counter-clock-wise route of my ancestors. I jumped from the United States to Europe, continuing thereafter in Israel, Egypt and South East Africa. The final destination is up in the air.
I left my home in Echo Park, Los Angeles, California, May 2009.
This DNA trek begins landing back into time, in ancient Rome and with my Mother’s story. That is where my travel diary starts. From this point on ZoeBios.com will carry you along with me, on the search and in the discovery. I’ll be sharing random notes and foraging, which like puzzle pieces will, with any luck, come together at the end in some sort of crazy complete-incomplete picture.
Maybe Berlin and DNA Memory own a true essence, that which, incubated with freedom and wisdom, has the ability to jump forward into a new powerful evolutionary process it wittingly manages.
I’m looking forward to the discovery. Hope you are too.
XXX
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