This article was originally published in Turkish on velvele.net on September 2, 2021. It was translated into English by the author and proofread by Mercan Baş.
26.08.2021
Istanbul – Sabiha Gökçen Airport
Today, I am flying from Turkey to Germany for the last time with my Turkish passport. Tomorrow morning, I have an appointment at the Munich Immigration Office. They will officially provide me with the document proving my German citizenship. I had migrated from Turkey to Munich about 11 years ago. Some people today tell me that I am privileged because I live in Germany. This is true. But this privilege does not cover up the hard work and the fact that I built everything from scratch… Zero budget, zero connections, zero pre-arranged opportunities. Great hopes, big dreams, and a strong confidence whose source I didn’t quite understand. Sometimes, I am surprised by the 27-year-old Sezgin. Now, the 37-year-old says that he can’t do that much anymore. Meeting new people, getting used to new streets, forming new friendships, and establishing a new routine is difficult. The 27-year-old is teasing. He says there’s no need for a routine; a room, a bed, a few books, and some music are enough. But he cannot forget his mother’s tears at the airport. That’s why, when he arrives at his new home in this land full of dark clouds, he first cries for a long time. He wonders, “What am I doing here?” Over time, he gets used to it. At 37, he’s mature. Now he knows that there will be tears at first wherever they go. He tries to accept what he cannot change and does not fight with his tears.
I am flying from this airport to that one for the last time. From this passport to that passport. This timing is somewhat symbolic, but of course, I didn’t arrange it this way. Bureaucracy, the pandemic, and appointments kept me waiting for months. Does it really matter what I want or think about my own life? Both in Turkey and in Germany. Because the authorities decide how things should be, I must give up one passport to get the other. Because they deem it appropriate, I wait three months for each small procedure. Because one side deems it appropriate, I am born a soldier, become a man, hold a gun, I cannot refuse or-escape. Because the other side deems it appropriate, I am addressed according to the color of my eyebrows and eyes, wait in long queues, and become someone based on a bureaucrat’s words. Because they deem it appropriate, I cannot swim in some oceans, hug some trees, or carry some flags. All because they have long since made decisions on my behalf. I continue to drift in the stateless gap between two countries, two homelands, two passports, two languages, and two genders.
Who am I? I used to ask myself this question a lot, but now I realize that from this point on, I can’t be any of those things even if I wanted to. Turkish, German, Middle Eastern, European, eastern, western, worldly. The feeling of having lost one part has finally found its home in this void that belongs nowhere. Didn’t this journey begin with my realization that no matter how much I try to escape, I will never find a sense of belonging? I am leaving Turkey for the last time with a Turkish passport. The officer says, “Lower your mask, take off your hat,” with a stern expression that never changes. He questions me with a tone that implies condescension, “Do you have a residence permit?” If he spoke politely and addressed me with “sen” (in an informal way as we distinguish in Turkish) I wouldn’t be uncomfortable, but he speaks roughly and even seems to think that addressing me as “siz”(in a formal way) is too much. I wonder if he would have spoken to me like this if I had serious clothes, a businessman’s briefcase, and stern eyebrows. I feel like engaging in a verbal fight, but I simply say, “Yes, I have it”. Shouting that I paid all the costs that I should have paid throughout my life to get that residence permit. There were times where I also thought that life and people owe me kindness. I board the plane.
26.08.2021
Munich
When I arrived here from Istanbul, I was filled with both tranquility and gloom. I no longer have to be careful with every move. I don’t have to push and shove with people to walk. I don’t have to be cautious of unexpected surprise attacks from somewhere. Calmly, I get off the plane and board a train where almost no one speaks. It takes a full hour to reach my home. There’s no unexpected traffic, no shouting drivers, and the outside is a dark green. One’s heart aches at such views, wondering why they are no longer in Istanbul. But something seems missing within these green fields. There are no pleasant moments spent with my family and friends I left behind in Turkey in this peaceful scene. No tea. No Turkish coffee. No fortune telling. No immediate bonding upon meeting. Instead, there is rain–gloomy, sorrowful, and peaceful.
27.08.2021
Munich
Soon, I will leave my home and become German. It’s a strange feeling. The “İ” of İnceel’s name will turn into the “I” of Inceel. To get this passport, I will need to give up my Turkish citizenship. My Irish friend says, “I wouldn’t give up citizenship like you did.” Of course, you wouldn’t. Because there’s no need. I feel like screaming because I worked my heart out until I became an ordinary citizen here due to the privileges that you have and I don’t have. I swallow. Just like I swallowed what the police said at the airport. I’m fed up with the judgments of white people about giving up Turkish identity. As if I was given a chance and I rejected it. When you move from one home to another, the chasm between where you came from and where you arrive grows so quickly that, by the time you realize that both sides are too far apart to understand each other, it’s too late. After that, you don’t have much energy to explain things. You just nod and sigh.
The day before, I was in Bodrum, where the weather was above 30 degrees Celsius. I went to the sea, sunbathed with my friends, and attended an open-air concert in the evening. Today, I am in Munich. The weather isn’t even 15 degrees. It’s rainy, windy, and cold. When I go outside, I put on my winter scarf, read a message from my friend saying, “I turned on the heater in August.” I am experiencing this harsh climate transition in my emotions and soul. I understand the sadness of being an expatriate more and more. Constantly missing places, trying to adapt to weather conditions, trying to express myself to others but never being understood. Swirling in the gray area between having been able to exist both there and here and not being able to exist either there or here. I am angry at people with more privileges, those who come from climates similar to this one. I wonder if we had to pay such a high price.
27.08.2021
Munich
I am now German. The official handed me my certificate in an extremely dry manner, made some formal remarks, and bid me farewell, eager to leave for lunch. It was such a normal day for him. He prepared a document of vital importance to me while his stomach was growling. Maybe after lunch, with the afternoon drowsiness, he changed another person’s life. Meanwhile, I walked the streets, unsure whether to cry or laugh. I am now German. How it has lost its meaning. My heart aches, but not from a nationalist place. Haven’t I always been waiting for and rejoicing in this day? The years of effort, the struggle to establish myself here, the nights I cried because I was away from home, the repeated stumbles and collisions with German bureaucracy for not being an EU citizen, the efforts to not sound like a child in a foreign language, my resistance against police officers who only ask for my ID in a crowded train, the back and forth between two countries’ different understandings. Wasn’t this day the dream that sustained me through it all. As I walk, the song “I Paid the Price” starts playing. Melike Şahin sings, “I deserve every millimeter of this straight smile.” At that moment, I’m texting Hazal from the Mental Klitoris podcast. She is also in another period of change in her life and has encountered this song. I write her that I was sure that those who haven’t passed through the Middle East won’t understand this song, but I could not prove it. She agrees. I think about the prices we’ve paid. The conditions under which we worked. What we created from scratch. I self-censor, feeling as if I don’t have much right to talk about these things. Only those who have flown between one home and another for such a long period can understand each other.
31.08.2021
Munich
I came to Germany with a scholarship from the European Union. It was a one-year program. I was supposed to return when it ended, but for some reason, I left Turkey as if I would never return. That’s why I was more upset about my mother’s tears. What can I do? I thought I had endured a lot there. When I talk to friends who moved from Turkey to Germany during the new period, some say that it wasn’t as difficult back then. So, it seems that each of us has different privileges, experiences, and perspectives. Or maybe each of us has a different turn in line.
At the end of my first year in Germany, as my scholarship was about to end, I applied for a PhD program and was accepted. It was a great development, but until the acceptance letter from the university arrived, I had no visa. When I went to the Foreigners Office to renew my visa (and discussing the treatment we received there would be another long story), the officer didn’t even listen to what I wanted. He said if my visa expired, I would need to return to Turkey until the university acceptance letter arrived and then restart the entire process from scratch. “What do you mean, for one month?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said, “that’s how the law is.”
To close up my home, pack my belongings, and return for a month, then start that long, gloomy process all over again. At that time, not knowing how things worked, I was wandering around upset until a colleague experienced in these matters said, “I know what they want, get an appointment, and we’ll go to that office together.” Although I didn’t fully understand how this would work, I agreed. Indeed, everything changed when I went to the Foreigners’ Office with a German. Even though they requested a thousand ridiculous documents, they decided to give me a temporary visa until the university’s paper arrived. That’s when I realized that the laws they referred to as fixed could be bent and twisted as they wished.
The PhD process was even more ridiculous. I wanted to work to cover my expenses. The job I found was a lower-level position compared to what I would have done in Turkey based on my field of study. But it’s okay, I thought, working is not harmful, and my goal is to finish my PhD. The Foreigners Office thought differently. I couldn’t study while working full-time. Why? I would fail my courses. But I have been doing this throughout my life?
That part doesn’t concern them; that’s how the law is.
These same laws don’t apply to EU citizens. Apparently, EU citizens’ minds work better automatically, allowing them to work while studying and earn money without worrying about a visa. This really sank in for me. I couldn’t even get angry. As if doing a PhD, living abroad, trying to realize oneself was easy, and while I was willing to work on large projects and also take side jobs, they kept putting additional obstacles in front of me. If you need to work to study here, then don’t study here. It seemed to imply, “We only accept the wealthy from poor countries.” Later, as I continued researching, I discovered that they could also bend and twist that law when they wanted. I eventually obtained both my work permit and my student visa. By waking up at 6 in the morning, working until midnight, and navigating the brink of exhaustion, I managed to bring my PhD to its final stage. I was accepted to present my doctoral thesis at a prestigious music education conference in the UK. I needed a visa. As many know, the UK doesn’t roll out the red carpet for us. On the contrary, they make it increasingly difficult to avoid going there. When I explained this tangled process, which is quite normal for us Turks, to my German friends, their eyes widened. Because they simply go when accepted to a conference. I prepared all my documents and went for the visa interview. I had a newly taken biometric photo as requested. I had taken the photo 15 days earlier, and in the meantime, my beard had grown. The officer fixated on my beard without paying attention to what I was doing or my purpose for going there. “But your photo doesn’t have a beard?” he says. Yes, it doesn’t, the beard grows in between, I say. He rolls his eyes. “Well, if the acceptance doesn’t come, you know the reason,” he says. I’m invited by your country to give an academic presentation after learning your language and moving from Turkey, but the thing I am judged for is my beard (and most likely my Middle Eastern background)? It settles in my chest, and I cry on the way home. When a similar situation happened two years later during the visa process for another speaking engagement in Ireland, I was already experienced. I didn’t cry this time; I was just angry. Yes, my white friend, while you listen to these stories with your mouth open and even judge me, accusing me of complaining too much, I am really fed up. I will no longer experience any of this with my new German passport. That’s why I paid the price with the passport of the place I came from, unlike you.
01.09.2021
Munich
Today is my birthday.
It’s my first birthday officially as a German citizen. I don’t feel like I’m reborn. No, it hasn’t been a major turning point in my life. I’ve always existed, and I will continue to exist. No piece of paper can erase my memories, experiences, or what I’ve seen. Looking at today from a place with no classes or borders, where all animals–human and non-human–live together peacefully, and privileges are distributed equally, as depicted by Aslı Alpar’s cartoons, I feel a bit sad about our situation but remain hopeful. I am happy because I know myself. I know my joys, sorrows, fears, secrets, darkness, light, and limits well. I exist, I explore, I care. I am not afraid to share and talk about the things I have risked to exist as myself and as I want. Because these are the things that make me who I am, not the papers in my hand.
