Israel - Abroad and Home

Since returning from Israel in mid-January, I have yet to blog about that amazing experience. I am, in some ways, still living it as you will see if you read on. The land of Israel is geographically diverse. Galilee was my favorite area probably because of the green landscape, flowers, wildlife, the hills, and the giant lake. You know the lake as the Sea of Galilee, but it is also known as Kinneret, Lake of Gennesaret, or Lake Tiberias.

The climate in January is very favorable for touring; it was not too hot and not too cold, with some much-needed rain for Israel. Although our travel party, primarily composed of US citizen from the South, thought the weather cold, I thought 50-70 F was perfect. The crowds were minimal (a huge plus for me!). Jerusalem, the city built of white stone, was breathtaking in all ways. Everywhere we went volumes of history unfurled in the sounds, sites, and smells.

I would love to make my home in Israel for half the year (if I were rich ;-). I felt very safe. The country is modern, progressive, and clean compared to surrounding nations. If you love ancient history and archeological ruins, you really have to go. We were blessed with one the best guide in all of Israel, Mishi Neubach.  Our traveling group $paid$ for that privilege but it was so worth it. If you are going to go, squeeze every drop of goodness out of the trip. To me, that means, excellent lodging and guides.  You do have to pay for that--there are no real bargains.

My scientific business for has been a bit slow in getting off the ground this year. Hence that can hardly be the excuse for my absence from the blog scene. Rather I have buried myself in home-related projects like remodeling, designing wall hanging systems, and researching Doug’s and my genealogy augmented with some genomic data analysis, or vice versa. It is this later activity that has my mind fully occupied.

Perhaps it is time to trade in this blog for a serious writing activity. The genre could be described as science-based fiction. This is NOT science fiction, which I abhor, but fiction fed by genomic-based science findings. Doing the research to write such a book plus my volunteer work would leave no time for my business—so my mind is still divided. It would be the first time in my adult life I have not been a serious breadwinner so I have to get over that hump, to write a book of fiction.

I realize that much of what follows may be boring for those of you who are not into geneological research or genomics or who were not adopted. The following bits of information are exciting for me since I enjoy history and a good data analysis puzzle. I also think having no knowledge of my ancestry or birth parents until the age of 35 contributes substantially to my interest in all this.

Several of the most interesting tidbits that I have been able to uncover include:

·        Doug is 1/3 Ashkenazi Jewish (decended from medieval German communities)

·        His mother is ½ Ashkenazi Jewish and his father is a 1/16^th

o  As it turns out in the mid-1800’s West TN had a thriving Jewish community close to Jackson. The population seems to have intermarried with Gentiles so although this is a surprise to all, there is a historical basis for this discovery.

·        My mother is 100% NW European, Irish.  No surprise there.  But my father is predominantly SE European.
These results are derived from the  EURO DNA algorithm.applied to the raw SNPs data.  The raw SNPs data is available through 23andme.  But the analysis you have to do on your own.

HAPLOTYPES
Haplogroup information comes directly out of 23andme and such companies--which is where I got our information.  From Wikipedia: "In human genetics, the haplogroups most commonly studied are Y-chromosome (Y-DNA) haplogroups and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) haplogroups, both of which can be used to define genetic populations. Y-DNA is passed solely along the patrilineal line, from father to son, while mtDNA is passed down the matrilineal line, from mother to offspring of both sexes. Neither recombines, and thus Y-DNA and mtDNA change only by chance mutation at each generation with no intermixture between parents' genetic material."

Since I am female, I have to get my paternal haplotype history from my birth father, who agreed to the 23andme test. [BTW so did my birth mother.  Their parentage of me was also confirmed as a side-effect of the 23andme analysis--but that was already known.]

Some of the haplogroup information is interesting but not mind-blowing:

o  Doug and I both have similar mtDNA (through our respective mother’s lines,  mtDNA)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_J_(mtDNA)) Doug is J1c3 and my mother is J1c2. There is an ancient Semitic connection with haplotype J through N in the figure below.    

o  On the paternal side the Y Haplotypes for Doug and my father’s are almost identical. My dad is R1b1b2a1 and Doug’s dad is R1b1b2a1a2. But this is a high level observation.  See the figure below.

One observes the finer points of paternal inheritance in Doug and my fathers using the EURO DNA algorithm.

o  My Dad is SOUTHEAST EURO with a Maximum Likelihood Estimate=71% (just think best
estimate if not a stat guru)

o  Doug’s Dad is NORTHWEST EURO: with a Maximum Likelihood Estimate=84%

But I think it gets way more interesting for my paternal grandmother, whose mtDNA is readily observable in my dad.

·        My father’s mother has a mtDNA haplotype X2b.

Although, X2b is fairly widespread globally, it is characteristic of 2 only groups:

o  Druze

o  Mi'kmaq (native american indians)

When in Israel we ate lunch at a Druze town and I learned about them and their customs firsthand.  Prior to my Israel trip, the Druze meant nothing to me.  I have been able to find many French Canadian, French Louisianan, and North American Native American Indians relatives through my Dad’s line on 23andme Relative Finder. My father and I both have some Asian ancestry that shows up in our DNA as does Doug, but Doug’s father does not.  Therefore it has to come through his mother. My mother has no Asian ancestry.  Below is my Dad’s ancestry painting from 23andme. The blue is European, the orange is Asian.  

I have spent about 4 hours plowing through records available in www.ancestry.com.  So far all has been consistent with everything I have found through the DNA work. In particular,  

o  On my mother’s side,  

o   her grandmother (my great grandmother) came over from Ireland as a widow with her
children and her adult sister to set up residence in NY.

o  On my father’s side,

o  His mother’s line is French through the Canadian maritime provinces, especially Nova Scotia.

o  On Doug’s side, my interest is his Jewish connection. I think it will be easiest to unravel through his mother’s side given that she is half, especially since her grandmother was from Brownsville, TN in Humboldt County. Brownsville had the oldest synagogue in TN.  I was told Doug’s great grandmother was from Brownsville. My plans include visiting the Jewish cemeteries in that area to get last names off gravestones. These old cemeteries are only about an hour from my house.

What I expected to find versus what I found was very different. My Dad, and especially his mother,  looked very Jewish to me when I found them 20 years ago.  Perhaps that dark look was Native Indian. Doug and his mother do not appear Jewish to me. But obviously this is not what I find in their SNPs. In part of my digging around, plus my interest in the Hebrew language I found this website (http://www.my-hebrew-name.com/) which I played around with to see what our family’s names were in Hebrew.

Doug and I have 6 adult children between us: Rachael, Jacob, Sarah, Danielle, Benjamin, and Justin. Hebrew reads from right to left. Ancient languages started out with hammer and chisel on stone tablets. They were “written” from right to left so that the author could see what he had previously engraved. Try it–you will see what I mean. My side (Nancy Elizabeth, Rachael, Jacob, Sarah, Danielle, Ben) all had direct translations to the Hebrew.  From my early teens on I have been fascinated by Jewish history, hence I gave all 5 of my biological children Hebrew names.  Douglas Neal and Justin are not derived from Hebrew names so their translations are based on the closest Hebrew equivalent based on the meanings of their names.