I am related to every person living in the world today. Incredible as it may seem in this agonising age of constant discord, so are you and the remainder of our planet’s entire 7.7 billion people.
Decades ago, scientists began unravelling our most ancient maternal and paternal heritage, down to our earliest shared ancestors who existed in Africa roughly between 150,000 and 200,000 years ago. Confirmation of my own “Out of Africa” numbered model, came in a summarised genetic analysis, indicating that while I am considered 100 percent “Broadly South Asian,” indisputably, I descend from this long line of women traced back to eastern Africa over 150,000 years ago.
Fascinated and excited, I slowly scrolled through the several sections of my personalised ancestry and health report released on Emancipation Day, August 1 last, thinking of how appropriate a date, for rocking the cradle and finally learning some of the secrets of my distinct DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, derived by a leading private genomic company from a single saliva sample. DNA is the hereditary material composed of two chemical chains that coil around each other to form the famous double helix of life, carrying unique genetic instructions that makes each of us who we are.
