Similarities
Sarah is surprised by the similarities between her and her ancestors whilst looking through the photo albums that belonged to her Great Aunt Reg.
"I first met my Aunt Reggie when I was too young to remember. She was the oldest sister of my grandmother and lived in White Bear Lake, Minnesota.
Visiting her over the years, I loved hearing her memories come to life. Especially about the journey her and her family made from Croatia to St. Louis in the USA and I wondered with awe at what it would have been like to sail across the Atlantic leaving relatives behind to start a new life in a foreign country.
Many years later, my mother showed me an album Aunt Reg had made of her family history. In it were stories of her family who had lived near Prague and Pilsen, Saag, Hatayan and Zeneta - places sounding so exotic and different to where I grew up.
What grips me most about the album is the collection of photographs held within. When I look through the pages, I see people at once familiar and alien - faces that I recognise through the eyes of my mother, the mouth of my Great Aunt, the cheek-bones of my grandmother. I see my frown on the brow of a distant uncle and my far away gaze in the face of my great, great, great grandmother.
Of all the stories my Great Aunt told, this one is most valuable to me - a slice of history and heritage I can read again and again and continue through my own journeys as she suggested at the end of her tale."
End slide - Regina Carolina Biza, 1907 - 2001.
Sarah Goodey
