– Terry Pratchett
“Where am I from?” “Where are we going?” “How did we get here?” These are questions that more than one of us in the family has asked time and again. You have to know where you have been and where you are to know where you are going. This is part of the reason in how this journey came to be. Ike has a keen affection for learning about his family tree and documenting the story of how we all came to be where we are. Both born in Jamaica, we believed, for the most part, that most of our ancestors were from there. But how could we be sure? This is why adding a genealogy aspect to our journey was a no-brainer.We wanted to know the whole story of our ancestry. In order to do so, we decided the best place to start was to get a baseline of our genetic makeup. This would start to “paint the picture” to all of us of the origins of our histories, the homelands of our ancestors and far more.
Ike’s Side of the Family:
| Global Region | Percentage |
| Sub-Saharan African | 82.2% |
| West African | 77.7% |
| Central & South African | 2.0% |
| Broadly Sub-Saharan African | 2.5% |
| European | 17.5% |
| British & Irish | 11.2% |
| Broadly Northwestern European | 4.2% |
| Broadly Southern European | 0.4% |
| Ashkenazi Jewish | <0.1% |
| Broadly European | 1.6% |
| Oceania | <0.1% |
| Broadly Oceanian | <0.1% |
| East Asian and Native American | <0.1% |
| Native American | <0.1% |
| Broadly East Asian | <0.1% |
| Unassigned | <0.3% |
Natalee’s Side of the Family:
| Global Region | Percentage |
| Sub-Saharan African | 66.3% |
| West African | 63.4% |
| Central & South African | 1.5% |
| East African | 0.1% |
| Broadly Sub-Saharan African | 1.3% |
| South Asian | 22.5% |
| European | 10.5% |
| British & Irish | 3.4% |
| Scandinavian | 0.3% |
| Broadly Northwestern European | 4.2% |
| Broadly Southern European | 0.5% |
| Broadly European | 1.6% |
| East Asian & Native American | 0.2% |
| Unassigned | 0.8% |
The test broke down our ancestry based upon 31 different populations around the world. We now have the ability to see the baselines for our ancestries across the globe and helped establish a few of the places we will visit in our coming explorations.
Not only were we able to connect with our origins but we were also able to connect with distant, living relatives through another unique aspect of a special: the Shared DNA service. This service illustrates who else out there shares our ancestries that has taken the test and willing to share their information. We had the ability to track these people and intend to connect with them on our travels. When we do meet up with these individuals, we will certainly share our stories.
The Journey
We laid out this 13-month journey in part to learn more about where we came from and learn about the different paths our ancestors walked. The journey will take us to Scotland where 17.6% of Natalee’s ancestral roots originated from. We also will explore different parts of Jamaica as a good portion of ancestors on both sides of our families lived their lives there. Some even came from Scotland to Jamaica as a British colony in 1802. The DNA results uncovered Natalee’s heritage in South Asia so we will be taking time to experience different parts of India to learn more about this part of her heritage. Several of the stops along the journey will be in Sub-Saharan and Western Africa as 78% of Ike’s ancestry is from Western Africa and there are traces of ancestry in Sub-Saharan areas of Africa on both sides of the family.
