Coming from a big fat Greek family split between Canada and Oz, there are lots of relatives for us to visit, however with limited time we couldn’t meet with everyone. But lucky for us we were able to meet with some cousins of my grandfather.
This time, we went to a beautiful town called Point Cook, just outside of Melbourne. We were able to meet with our lovely relatives and were hosted by our cousins Lilly and Cliff. We spent time hearing the great stories behind their adventures since leaving the village in Greece. Another interesting thing….Lilly and her dad designed and built her home – it is amazing!
The Sarros family, (Lilly’s grandmother was a Papulkas) settled in Altona and set up a milk bar right by the beach and pier. They grew up running the milk bar and living life along the water.
The family were such an integral part of the town that they named a street after them. If you look carefully at the picture of the family dinner, you will see a picture of the pier painted by cousin Lilly.
Together we explored the Point Cook and Altona communities and fed the ducks. We actually saw black swans!
We then went to Williamstown, a picturesque heritage sea town that looks over the Melbourne skyline.
Of course, it is normal for people here to watch the boats go by and eat fish and chips. We enjoyed a great afternoon spending time together and learning about our families.
Another interesting thing we learned from Lilly….she had her DNA tested done by the National Geographic Project and found out more about our ancestral heritage. We thought for sure we would be tracked back to either Alexander the Great or Ghengis Khan. We were surprised to find out neither was in Lilly’s DNA…but rather links back to Estonia, Italy, and Poland!!! Even more interesting is there are connections to royalty from the Ottoman empire!! We were not surprised to find out that we are princesses – we didn’t need a test to tell us that! But we are very interested in getting the test done once back at home….we are sure the results will be interesting!
Comments
10 responses to “Our Big Fat Aussie Family – (Part 3)”
It almost ‘feels’ like the view from the TO islands to Toronto. You have certainly been most fortunate meeting so many branches of your family. And royalty, you say? Well isn’t that grand! That will help keep the posture straight ( tee hee). I fear that if I look too deeply into my background, I may find minstrels and vagabonds …..( my passions for music and my restlessness ).
Hi Herta,
You are so right – Melbourne really reminded us of Toronto in so many ways! We feel very blessed to have so much family in Oz – but it’s hard to visit that often – so when we get the chance – we go full out and visit and meet as many people as we can. I think we have some vagabond is us as well:)
Great to be back receiving the blogs. Thanks Oliver.
Can’t wait to hear about your background when you get home! A milk bar sounds very interesting too!
Travel safely
Love Doreen
HI Doreen,
Glad you are back with us! What we learned in Aussie talk is that a Milk Bar is a “take away” stand – similar to Real McCoys restaurant in Toronto. And we will do our DNA testing as soon as we return home…you never know if there is more family to meet close by!
Hi, Katina, to follow you all on this trip through your postings is so amazing and also wonderful to get to know more of your family’s history and their lives after leaving the “old country”. It’s great that everybody shares the stories of their beginnings and their current lives. There should be a book!. Thanks for sharing, lots of Hugs and Love
HI Oma,
THis is our book – an eBook that is!…hopefully we can add to it as we continue our travels in the years ahead.
K:)
Hi Kat,
That was really neat meeting Lilly and her Family. She is quite an accomplished artist! I guess they never met Baba Ina and Baba Fotini It was really interesting learning about her DNA! It was certainly lovely that you got to meet these wonderful family members! Love, Mom
Hi Mom,
Auntie Margaret said she knew of teta Menka’s sisters and Baba Ina kept in touch with them, but since her passing, things have changed. Hopefully we will all stay and touch and continue the family tree!
Cheers”)
I had no idea you had such extended family in Australia!! I had family emigrate there as well from England. Would love to meet up with them. What a wonderful way to bring to a close this amazing journey! Seems strange to see everyone in hats and coats – I guess your efforts to chase summer are over – until of course you return home!!
Love to you all, miss you tons but I have so enjoyed the journey with all of you. I know the blogs have been a lot of work but just think you won’t have a bag full of photos sitting in your closet waiting to go into a photo album (seven years since our Europe adventure and the pictures are still in a bag!!). You have created your memory books along the way – it will be fun for all of you to reflect back on your journey through your amazing blogs. Thank you!!
Hi Gail,
We didn’t know we had that many relatives as well! It was lots of fun meeting and spending time with them all – there is nothing better than family!
Anyways – you are right….I’m glad we did all of our blogs along the way, (not sure the others would agree with me!), but in time, I know they will appreciate all of the hard work as we have trouble remembering what we did at the beginning of the trip…the blog will always be there as our souvenir!
Cheers,
K:)