to work in the Black Bottom, a predominantly black neighborhood. When African Americans are beaten or taken advantage of by whites, the characters in Middlesex "suddenly are nearsighted" to the racial prejudice. Despite being in the United States for only 10 years and having experienced racism herself, she can, Zecker noted, "recite at heart the slights at blacks as lazy, dirty, sexually promiscuous, and incapable of self-help." She and other whites, including immigrant whites, feel rage because they are "convinced they were somehow forced out of Detroit following 1967." While walking through the neighborhood, a group of African-American men loafing in front of a barbershop wolf-whistle to Desdemona and make lascivious comments, thus confirming the racial stereotype. Zecker remarked that in an ironic twist, immediately after the riots, Desdemona's family is shamed by a white realtor who "doubts their fitness (whiteness)" to live in the rich city Grosse Pointe. In the 1970s, African Americans, instead of Mediterraneans, were discriminated against through redlining. Zecker opined that by framing African Americans as the "eternal destroyers" and white ethnics as "yet again the oppressed innocents", Eugenides "captures perfectly the dominant narrative of urban decline in the early twenty-first century American Zeitgeist." Insurance settlement from the damage caused at the riots allows the Stephanides to purchase a home away from the African Americans. The family participates in the white flight from the city to avoid the racial desegregation in the public schools, sending Cal to a private school. Ethnic identity When Lefty and Desdemona are forced to immigrate to the United States, they have different mindsets. Whereas Lefty embraces his new country's customs, Desdemona is adamant that she will follow her old country's ways. For example, she is angered that her "immigrant hair" is chopped off because she does not want to "look like an Amerikanidha" and decides to regrow her hair immediately. Lefty attempts to assimilate into American culture by zealously learning English. Lina, the cousin of Lefty and Desdemona, is the paragon of immigrant integration. Cal noted: "In the five years since leaving Turkey, Sourmelina had managed to erase just about everything identifiably Greek about her." Cal's father, Milton, and his friends and family cherish their Sunday gatherings. They debate and tell stories to each other, attempting to regain their ethnic roots. A "contrarian", Milton enjoys debating Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger and lamenting the steep cost of church candles. Eugenides repeatedly