This month marks 10 years since my mother and I made the move from our Volcano home on the Big Island to Michigan. We’ve come (quite literally) a long way, but what an epic adventure, full of all the inevitable highs and lows, it’s been and continues to be.
While I miss the islands daily and the kindhearted people that hold dear the ideology of “living with aloha,” I’ve been lucky enough to meet equally as caring individuals in Michigan over the last decade. A lot of the important people in my life today I would never know if we didn’t move to this state, and that’s something I’m so grateful for.
Looking back, I remember the initial culture shock of moving from the island to Southwest Detroit. I had visited my uncle’s home, which was once my grandparent’s home, several times before relocating. Being from a small town myself, I always loved traveling to the big city to see my uncle and to explore the sites. A former merchant marine that worked as a baker on the Ford ships traveling the Great Lakes, my uncle made the best homemade Hungarian food when I would visit. I always told him I would love to live in Michigan, I never knew it would ever become a reality.
