weaving the quilt

He says let's go to Tunisia. I should be excited. I always burden myself with these shoulds and woulds. Well I am not excited. I am weary and anxious. I feel heavy with choices and decisions. I do want him to be near me now. I also want to fulfill his wish. He may be curious about the place. I got curious because I felt going to that workshop there will help me fight racism I face at my work. His gesture is welcome but I am scared.

I am scared because I am scared of travel these days. Dealing with airports brings fear and stress to me. I have the wrong passport. The wrong name and the wrong skin color. 

I am troubled because this travel would be about me. Well about me and about him too. I am scared because I feel I have other commitments, other considerations I have to make. What about that turkey plan I had for a while? That plan also came from so many different places. A chance to have fun. To catch up with friends whose friendships were interrupted by my departure. A chance to revisit our memories and heal the wounds of the past. A chance to have fun and relive my happy memories in instanbul. But importantly too, my family. How do I manage to do this? How do I get to see them? How do I deal with this pain of separation? 

I need to quench this ache, and I want to see my friends, and I want to have fun and I want to please the boy who managed to give some warmth to my life. How does one prioritize these things? How do I get to decide? Who do I talk this through with? I feel heavy, so heavy.

  

Snippets

Let's write in snippets style, because it gives us a chance to talk about a lot of random things without really bothering with structure.

Should I talk about the aggressions of the day? Or the highlights? Let's not pretend. It was a bad day, that ended with some attempts for self remedy.

I get out of bed with great difficulty. After I got to Nolle, I almost turned around and went home. I endured and went to the office. Those others struggling with German during the meeting made it better. I guess I was more exhausted than irritated, except for the dog comments. My suggestion to have an Arabic speaking support group triggered her to suggest to have a support group for dogs. I quickly scanned everybody's face. Nobody expressed the slightest of dismay. Many were laughing or seemingly amused. It reminded me when Kilomba talked about how the white guy who played jazz joked about KKK with his white friends and sharing that with his black girlfriend. It reminded me as well of that time when I dated an Ossi and I would remind him of a song called Killing An Arab. The French guy's consoling comment about me finding a boyfriend one day didn't also help.

At least I played with Abi, who had a beautifully surprised face when he learned I am African too. I know I don't look black enough, I wanted to say. I had to think of Marwan, particularly when he begged me to play some more and asked me to sit on my lap while he plays his Mario on a gadget I don't know its name. 

Things kicked in at a certain moment. My certainty that my hemorrhoids are back. My despair and confusion about the situation with Gian. All my anxieties about being loveless and unloveable. The detachment and isolation and coldness of berlin life. My sense of duty towards the requests to be present for the three refugee friends I met along the journey. My broken promises to put myself first.

I try to heal with food, TV distraction and writing. Be kind to yourself Kat.

sell your body

"I don't like Germans. Why should I sleep with them without getting paid?"

"You won't make it here in Germany unless you sleep your way up."

Two statements. Two different people. Two different privileges. Two worlds apart. Same city.

We learn something from sex workers. There is a fuck you world attitude about them that you can't resist. You know they survive things you can't even imagine. They survive better than you. They're stronger. They made it that far. You have to listen up and learn. When she describes Germans as disgusting, you know she has a point. A very spot on point. She knows their worth. She knows how cheap they are. How greedy. How far they fed and still feed on the bodies of brown and black people. She is the one who sees them for what they are. It's the brutal honesty of sex workers that 

 I move to the second statement. It was the bourgeoisie student. The privileged one who speaks German already. The one who resists the language of antiracism, who's reluctant to call white people white. It is his moment of disclosure. He sold his body to get ahead. To get a job. A promotion. A flat. Or even a visa. It was his shame that was preventing him from admitting the truth about Germany. Because he played the game with them. He sold his body and he tried to cover it up. He made them look better than what they are because he was ashamed of selling his body. Those bourgeoisie fantasies and lies. This self-centering that fucks us up and eats us alive.  

February must end

Everybody is touched by Giulio's brutal and tragic death. How do I explain my particular feelings around it? How it hits a certain chord because I am seeing Gianmarco. How he looks like him, two Italians venturing with their researching eyes into oriental lands. They approached though with more love than condescension. How possible is it that the fight I had yesterday with Gianmarco is about Giulio? The day he the news of his death came out, I avoided meeting him. It was too terrifying to think of talking about it.

Do I find reasons to push people away? Do I hide behind politics? Why did I grill him so much about cultural appropriation? Was that really why we were fighting or was something else, something deeper? 

He tells me I am distant, and he is right. I feel like I have tons of reasons to be distant. One was the virus. Now that we got this off the chest, I have the boyfriend thing. I have no real qualms about seeing a guy who has a boyfriend, especially that he couldn't be further away from not only berlin but all of europe. But maybe it does make me anxious. Why does dating make me so anxious? I'm too anxious to even know what I really feel for him. I was looking forward to see him that day, even though we had met only two days before. Is it the February effect? The need for warmth and cuddles to make through the long painful berlin winter?    

back from california

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