I went to Detroit/Southfield to see my grandma. My grandma isn’t doing well, she is in pain and she can’t do anything like walk or ANYTHING at all. She has a nurses aide that comes to her house twice a day. She’s suffering but she was happy to see me. One day I played music for her on my iPhone, she likes religious/spiritual music so I played Mary Mary and Chris Tomlin. I asked her about her childhood, she was telling me about graduating from high school in Georgia and after high school she moved to Michigan to find job. She ended up meeting my grandpa and getting married instead.
I had a nice time seeing family, my aunts and uncle and cousin. I saw my friend Yasminah who I hadn’t seen since 1993. We went to a nice vegan restaurant for lunch called Chive. Me and my aunt Vicki and cousin Apryl went to a Vegan Soul restaurant where they had vegan catfish that taste like real catfish.
On the last night I was there, I met my cousin Helene in downtown Detroit. We went to the Greektown Casino. I don’t gamble but it was impressive and lively. I ate a hummus pita that was delicious down there. Oh yea and there was a Wahlburgers across the street from the casino. I love the Wahlberg’s, well mostly just Donnie. Then we went back to my cousins house in Detroit and met up with her friend Latese. We had some jello shots that were pure hard liquor. ridiculous. We smoked a little. Ok I didn’t smoke cause I have a sore throat but they blew it in my face. So we were there for about 30 minutes, then we went to my Aunt Rhonda’s apartment. My Aunt Rhonda has a bar in her house filled with more liquor than a liquor store. Literally. Everything you could possibly want or conceive of was there from 1800 to Moonshine to daiquiri to Remy. Everything. I found a big bottle of Cake rum in her stock and I claimed it as mine for the night. It was sweet so I didn’t need a chaser. I drank it straight over ice all night. I drank the whole bottle. We listened to music. Despite their protests, I played one Korean song by BTS called “Mic Drop”, they said it sounded like any other hip hop song. Then we went to a cabaret. It was BYOL (bring your own Liquor) so I brought the cake rum. Helene brought Patron. Don’t remember what everyone else brought. Anyway it was fun, my brother met up with us there. I hadn’t seen him in a few years, like 6 years.We left there at like 2 am. I slept at my cousin house and got up really early like 7am to get back to my grandma’s house to see her before I headed to the airport.
I had catfish 3 times on my trip to Detroit. Once at the airport, once at a soul food restaurant around the corner from grandma house called Motor City Soul Food, and once at the cabaret. It was so good, there’s no place in this town I live in to buy fried catfish that I know of. There’s no soul food restaurant here either.
Also at the airport at this duty free shop they had a Tom Ford section and I really want the Tom Ford Vanilla Fatale perfume but it’s $225 for the smaller bottle. I really really want it.
For some reason right before I left grandma gave me money. I was like “why are you giving me money?” She said she appreciated me coming to see her so she wanted to give me something. Anyway it was a nice gesture but I’d rather have something I could keep to remember her by, like a piece of jewelry or some old pictures, or a blanket/quilt or a piece of clothing, something like that. We did take pictures though so that’s good. I don’t know if I will ever see my grandma again to be honest.
Here’s a picture of us. 
When I was a child, I thought my grandma was white. I was a teenager when I realized she wasn’t white. LOL Some people say there is a resemblance, we have similar noses.
There’s more pics on my Instagram.
Anyway it was a good trip.
