My mother's daughter

I just recovered from a wonderful 4 days with my mother here in Salonika. My first official visitor! The temperatures climbed above 35 degrees and the ice cream melted before you could say "mums" (yum in Danish). We spent a lot of down time together, walking the city or lying on my bed and couch just sorting out the business of running the world. A few really nice dinners and one night at the Electra Palace, complete with luxurious room, 2 swimming pools, hammam, sauna, jacuzzi and massage... Mmmm, well-deserved after last weeks fight against time to finish my first thesis draft.

My mom bought me a beautiful tavli board (backgammon) which will forever remind me of all those hours Yase and I spent on the balcony (Dr. B2) swearing and cursing, trying to change the luck of the game... It was a pleasure having her here, showing her around time, introducing her to Yan and Yase, Giorgos and Jenny (my Greek family) and all their hippie friends - and it was a pleasure for me to pretend to be on holiday for a couple of days. Enjoying a good dinner on the roof of the Electra Palace made me feel like I regained some part of me that I had lost for a while - and since I have now become extraordinarily good at directing my mind i.e. turning it off from thesis work and stress, it is actually possible to let the mind be empty, especially when floating around in a swimming pool all alone while listening to Mozart.

This is a job for... SuperSara!

Just as I thought I couldn't feel more isolated in my research work / thesis production, Uffe steps in and saves the day. A great thanks to Lars who on his blog made a comment about it.

In the Sunday edition of Berlingske Tidende, Uffe Ellemann-Jensen, former Minister of Foregin Affairs for Venstre (the Liberal Party) said that an impartial scientific study should be carried out in order to establish the real character of the infamous 'tone' in the Danish debate about 'foreigners'. What a blessing! It was basically a confirmation of my right to do what I'm doing - and that I'm not alone in thinking this is necessary for the future of Denmark. There are way too many easy labels to put on people - I particularly don't like the frequent and indiscriminate use of 'racist', 'hatred against foreigners' (fremmedhad) for the one side and 'idealist' (used as a bad word), left-wing radicals and so forth about people who think something is kind of 'rotten in the State of Denmark'. I insist on my right to be tolerant towards people who live their lives differently than me - but I retain my right to be against any expression of prejudice (whether it be committed by 'proper Danes' against 'foreigners' or by Pakistani-Danish men against the women in their families), violence (whether it be committed by white supremacists in Beligum or by brothers of sisters who love someone they are not supposed to) and ignorance. Yes, the last one might be my primary focus of action. Einstein once said

"There are only two things that are infinite - the Universe and ignorance. But I'm not sure about the first one"

I like it. Therefore, I am currently fighting my own ignorance about the deeper meaning of what is being said in the Danish public discourse but also trying to make a small contribution to eliminating some of the general Danish ignorance about our primary 'others'. It is not about calling people racists - it is about learning how to live together, about the Danish people realising the power they exercise against their minorities through producing a social truth every single day in the newspapers. I want to change that truth. But first I have to show that it is bad for Denmark.

So, right, where was I. Oh yes, Uffe was quoted in the newspaper. I was uplifted and got so excited that I couldn't even explaing it properly to my mother on the phone. Because, my friends, it shows that sticking to your guns (I want to study History of Ideas, I want to focus on Human Rights, I think there is a need for people to work on how Danish people think) can actually be validated - even if just by the opposition it meets (cf. the hectic debate in the newspaper about whether such a study should actually be carried out). So this time, I have to thank myself even though it sounds kind of silly. Thank myself for following my academic instinct through all the years. Bravo, me!

Oh, the happiness of drinking...

What better to do when you're busy with your thesis than to spend a Tuesday night with two Danish KFOR soldiers (who you thought were never going to call because you made a perfect arse of yourself when you met them) in the tempting bars of Salonika? My two new friends respectively from the South of Denmark and the East had a couple of hours off when they came here to pick up cleaning stuff for their Danish friends in Kosovo, and they decided to invite me out. First though, they followed me to watch my woman, Yasemin, do her much talked about Afro-Brazilian dance performance which we all enjoyed. A perfect sunny eve to watch Brazilian lovelies capoeira away and Yasemin and her friends shake their thang to the sound of drums.

I have been blessed with encounters these past months; I have been given the opportunity to make unlikely friends and meet remarkable people. These two Danes are no exception. Even though I was close to dying yesterday from the hangover this night incurred, I had a warm and fuzzy feelings about being in this place and having these rendez-vous with people I would never have befriended under 'normal' circumstances. Again, I feel thankful.

What is more, I have the unbelievable joy of welcoming my mother to Salonika next weekend! She is arriving the day after I have to submit the first draft of my thesis to my supervisor, and I'm counting on a few days total relaxation and coffee drinking while soaking up some gentle mamma-love. Who is luckier than me?!

Kosova under my skin

When I went to Kosova with my Master's programme in January, I had the incredible fortune of meeting a generous and good-natured family, the Kastratis, where I and 3 other E.MA girls spent a week occupying 2 of the 4 rooms in the house. They normally live 7 people there - mother and father, father's mother and the 4 children Katrina, Fisnik, Visar and Loriku. Since Thessaloniki is only 4½ hours by train to Skopje and another 2 hours on bus, I promised I would come back to visit them before I leave this part of Europe. So I went.

I saw a very different Kosova this time, partly because the place doesn’t look so utterly hopeless in the spring time (or whatever it is we are having now) and partly because I had the time for the type of conversations that really teach you something. The family arranged an outing Friday evening to the forest near the city – it was like coming home, for some reason the vegetation is similar to that of ‘my forest’ back home in Aarhus. We walked and talked and listened to the birds – and turned a corner and found the former most luxurious hotel in the area in ruins. Apparently the hotel had been occupied by the Serbs, and NATO targetted it as one of their first 'enemy dwellings'. I have never seen anything like it in my life. In the dusk it looked like a pile of bricks – but with clear signs of life reminding me that people died in there. Now, being the sentimental and very protected geek that I am, it obviously made a big impression on me. Whoever these people were, they died a horrible death in there. I’ve never really understood ‘horrible death’ before but it came to me in that forest right then, and I was very afraid (of death and horrible things that can happen to you before you die, but mostly of the people who can do such things to other humans) and panicked.

The day after, I went up to Mitrovicë to have a look around with the oldest son in the family. Had an embarrassing experience with the Danish KFOR up there and am sure they’re laughing at me at least for the next month. I was lucky enough to meet some relatives of the family in Pristinë; they had fled the town in 1999 on foot, walking all the way from Mitrovicë to Albania! Bajram, the father of the family, started talking – and talking and talking and talking. He had been filming events of Kosova since 1987 so he had some incredible footage of demonstrations by miners in the north walking all the way to Pristinë to join an even bigger demonstration and also of the 38 Albanian conscripts to the Yugoslav army who were sent back to their families in coffins, apparently having committed suicide. The footage showed their mangled and beat up faces and a couple of them had been loosely stitched together after someone had stolen their organs!

On my way back on Sunday, I got stuck in Skopje, honestly an extremely desolate and hopeless place, for a bunch of hours without Macedonian money (so I couldn't go to the bathroom before I figured out how to get some). The experience turned from *argh* to *sob* when I met two of the kindest French military police officers. They both work in Kosova (at least for a little while still, being employed by the UN Mission to Kosovo means going home at the end of the month for many of the police officers). These two fellas told me stories about their work, about their lives and engaged in all my wonderments with enthusiasm. I asked and asked, and they elaborated and spoke with such humanity that it's hard to describe. I admire these humans that spend their days saving girls from prostitution through human trafficking and constantly try to improve the workings of the UN and international cooperation in general. We spent some 7 hours together in the train station and on the train and by the end of the night, my ears were ringing and my brain was blowing steam out of my ears to try to process all this new information.

As I will probably never see these two again, and I need to direct my thankful thoughts somewhere, a heart-felt gratitude goes out to all those humans out there being human, working for a better world, neglecting themselves and sacrificing other life privileges still finding it useful and worthwhile to do the jobs they do.

Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of Peace must be constructed
(from the UNESCO Constitution)

Peace out....

Understanding

I haven't been blogging for a while, mainly because I always start thinking too much before writing and then never get around to it. This morning, I read a very sad story in the Danish newspaper, a story I've heard about before but not known the specifics of.

Apparently last year, Slagelse, a provinsial kind of town about an hour from Copenhagen, became the scene of a so-called 'honour killing'. A Danish-Pakistani girl was murdered by her brother because she fell in love with and eventually married the wrong man (who was also originally from Pakistan). How can someone kill their own little sister? As much as I try to advocate in my work and general doings that respect and understanding are the building blocks of co-existence of different (cultural) groups in society, I don't understand this - or rather, I really don't want to understand.

It is wrong to kill a person, it's so tragic when it's someone the perpetrator knows - but it is outright sickening and utterly hopeless to kill your own family whether your wife, lover, partner or children, siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles. I really don't understand how someone can do such a thing. Like I don't understand how two children in Tønder, DK were 'rented out' by their parents - yes, you heard me, their PARENTS - to strange men in their 50s and 60s who had a tendency to enjoy certain carnal pleasures with children. Aaaarrgh, what in Gods name is wrong with these people??!

And now an interesting point that popped up in my head; the 'honour killing' of the Danish-Pakistani girl was used by different voices in the media to highlight the problems with integration and letting people be 'allowed' to practice their own cultural traditions. I dig. Doesn't make sense to allow people to kill their sisters because some tradition tells them so BUT apparently, Danish traditions tells us to prositute our children (if we are to follow the logic of generalising from one instance to entire cultures) so in actual fact, 'we' shouldn't even be allowed to sustain 'our own' culture in Denmark. You see what I mean?