2022 Year In Review: Our Favorite Feelgood Stories
I think we will all face challenges this year. But many good things have happened . Here are some of our favorite love stories we bring to you in 2022:
Pride Fair and Renaissance collide at the Michigan Festival
Incredible entertainment, rousing drag queens and soulful pop tunes are just some of the sights and sounds that fill the streets during Pride each June. But this July, a new kind of pride has arrived, filled with pirates, princesses, and even the occasional charmer.
In the woods of Vassar, Michigan, the Michigan Renaissance Festival is held over three weekends each year in July. This year, on Saturday 23 July, festival-goers had the opportunity to showcase their famous Renaissance style for the first time at Pride is at the Fair.
“We don't have to pretend to be someone we're not. We can get this weirdness,” says Nicole Mai, a living history buff. “It's everyday wear for me and I get all these things from the world like weird looks and teases and 'what are you wearing? liberating.
Ramadan Mubarak! El Harissa's "Taste of Tunisia" in Ann Arbor
This year we bring you the holy month of Ramadan with a cookbook to help you break your fast.
One of the places we visited was El Harissa on North Maple Road in Ann Arbor. Khaled Homed and his son Youssef welcome Radio Michigan to the café and sell the best fresh and hot iftar classics: Tunisian bricks and Fatima fingers.
Youssef Homed describes the blend as "The Taste of Tunisia".
Michigan morning: Dance the night away with techno icon Carl Craig
This story is part of Mornings in Michigan, our series about morning rituals in the state. Formerly Radio Michigan
Producer Erin Allen takes us to the Motion Electronic Music Festival at Hart Plaza:
If you're in downtown Detroit on Memorial Day weekend, you'll hear the rumble of the electronic music festival Motion at Hart Plaza. While the festival usually ends at midnight each day, there is a late night – or rather, early morning – dance music scene that turns the action into a 24-hour event.
I stayed up until Sunday morning to attend one of the movement's official parties, the Detroit Love Party. The lineup is star-studded, and one person on the bill is Detroit native and techno icon Carl Craig. Craig is a DJ, songwriter and producer and one of the founders of the original movement known as the Detroit Electronic Music Festival.
MICHIGAN SABA: At the beginning of Ramadan, thousands gather for food, faith and friendship
Every weekend during the holy month of Ramadan, thousands of people gather in Dearborn for the Ramadan Sahure festival. A former Sears parking lot has been transformed into a dawn-to-dusk hangout.
Queues to get in on the festival atmosphere in the parking lot outside downtown Fairlane in Dearborn. Event organizers charge a $1 entry fee, which will be donated to a local charity. There is a large glittering tunnel adorned with fairy lights and a flaming crescent moon.
Visitors are greeted with excerpts from the sermon of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him) during Ramadan.
It said: “(Today) is the best day. This is the night, the best night. The hour, the finest hour."
425,000 Michigan residents may have difficulty seeing this bird; Could change
Some visitors to Michigan's two state parks will see something they've never seen before: bright red, orange, and yellow waterfalls.
One in 12 men and one in 200 women is colorblind. There are approximately 425,000 people in Michigan who don't see about 90% of the colors and shades that the rest of the population sees. Some colors don't stand out. Many people with color blindness see red as brown. Green looks a bit brown or gray. The northern cardinal does not tolerate red-green leaves.
A few years ago, Tennessee Tourism contacted a company that makes glasses that actually help people with color blindness see the full spectrum of colors. They want to make everything more accessible.
"It's especially special to see the leaves turn in the fall in the Smoky Mountains," said Kent Streib, vice president of communications and partnerships at Enchroma.
Podcast USA: Grand Rapids poet reinvents rent
Artists have long been key players in social justice and community outreach, but Grand Rapids' creative teams want to play a bigger role in the real estate market. Their latest project literally reinvents affordable living and aims to set community members up for long-term success.
Marcel Price, known as "The Fable" in the Grand Rapids community, is a former Urban Poetry Laureate and executive director of The Diatribe, a non-profit organization focused on youth. He joined the US in discussing Diatribe's new affordable housing planned for the southeast side of the city.
Not Your Mother's Minions: A Weekend of Eccentricity and Entertainment at the Detroit Puppet Slam
When you hear “puppet show” you probably think of bulging eyes stuffed into socks. Or maybe you think so
Sesame Street or Jim Henson's famous film The Dark Crystal. But chances are you've never seen the puppet show at the 2022 Detroit Puppet Slam.
From fleshy talking plants to giant black cats, this weekend's Detroit Puppet Slam will feature real puppets in a series of live performances. We spoke to some of the artists who will be performing, as well as Kary Morris, founder of the nonprofit SLAM: Detroit Puppet Company.
After several years as a puppet curator at the Detroit Institute of Art, Cary purchased a home in Detroit near the Hamtramck border and founded Cary Morris Arts Productions, which would become the Detroit Puppet Company. What began in 2015 as a massive performance and arts space has grown into arts programs, professional development for local artists, and space-saving initiatives for Northwest Detroit and Hamtramck.
40 Years of Literature and Love at the Oak Park Bookstore
If you're looking for a quiet, peaceful place to enjoy a good story, your local bookstore is second to none. But with growth
Large retailers and online retailers, as well as independent stores, face stiff competition, but none of that has deterred the owners of Book Beat in Oak Park. Tucked away in an innocuous corner of the mall, the shop has been thriving for 40 years.
Carrie Lauren and Colin Comer have been selling local wares at Book Beat since 1982. Together they set up shop in the same location, taking over a premises owned by a maternity clothing store. The small but mighty shop on Greenfield Road has thrived over the years despite hardships and is celebrating 40 years in business in August.
The Treetop Suspension Bridge, MSU's hidden gem, could attract more visitors
Natural pearls are hidden away in Michigan and people walk past them without even knowing what they are.
Secret Lake Gardens is located in Lenawee County, approximately ten miles west of the township of Tecumseh. The park director claims that this place has been around since 1926, but many don't know it.
Chuck Gross drives M-50 through Secret Lake Gardens every day on his way to work. He worries that more people don't know.
Most visitors take the six-mile route through forest and orchards. They didn't even get out of the car to explore the 12 miles of hiking trails.
He's right. What if a secret garden by the lake adds to the charm? Something you have to walk a bit to get there.
