Yearly New Year's Roundup: A Good Year For Me, A Bad One For The World

The countdown is on, we have almost made it: 2016 is in its final lap. This horrendous year for the planet is finally nearing an end, and although we will still live on a worse planet on January 1, 2017, than the one we occupied the same day in 2016, I think it comes as a relief to everyone that at least this torturous year is a memory. For me, 2016 was one of the best. The world, however, can't say the same thing. Almost none of the great things we expected happened except Leo DiCaprio finally winning the Oscar. This time last year we had hope for the planet, a female President, a stronger Europe and multicultural, tolerant and modern societies. Well, that hope was shattered with the most brutal force. Not only didn't we get Hillary, we got a lunatic asshole instead. Not only did we not get more tolerance, we got way more terrorists. And instead of a stronger Europe, almost the entire continent is preparing to vote for Nazi-enthusiasts once more next year. What a difference a year makes...

For me personally, the year started with a completely different expectation to what actually happened as well. I was in Moscow, fulfilling a lifelong dream. I was there with a boy, and at the time that was a nice thing. They say you spend the year with whoever is around on New Year's Eve. Instead, the boy I chose for that hooked up with the next chick the minute I left the country five days later (and, so it turned out, had already been doing so). Without telling me, of course. I found out in May when I was already way past caring, which makes writing this easier. What sounds like a sad story is, in fact, a huge contribution to why 2016 was such a success for me: I let go of a 10-year-old question mark that became an exclamation of "Sina, stop wasting your time!". My consequent reconciliation with my ex wasn't a result of that but felt way less forced than all the other reconciliations (there were plenty!) Despite this wonderful silver lining, two years of being in a relationship also came to an end and that, retrospectively, was also the right thing to happen. In the age of truly identifying what I want and need, the solitude made me make the right decision for myself. My relationship in Egypt never failed, but it ended because change was needed... and achieved.

The other biggie, of course, was leaving Egypt. I was sad to be leaving my boyfriend, but I never once doubted that leaving Egypt was the right step, and neither did he. There are few things in life you just feel are right, and when they come along, you still question them. Now, months after, I haven't missed Egypt even once, embracing my life back in Europe in a way I couldn't have had without the experience of living and loathing Cairo. Hearing all this, you may ask yourself why I celebrate a year in which men lost my love because they couldn't keep it in the pants (literally, mere hours both times!) and had to leave my lover behind, and the answer is very simple: it just had to happen. Everything that followed was positive. Duh, getting over a guy who doesn't appreciate you is easy, but actually realizing what you have in those who do appreciate you is a major lesson to learn. Leaving someone you love is harder, but finally accepting the end of something deemed to fall apart is liberating, saves everyone time and heartache and allowed both of us to continue to feel positive about each other.

The only thing I can really criticize about my personal year 2016 was the confusion about my career, and the countless times I was almost chosen to make all my dreams come true, but wasn't. This year, I applied and interviewed with Huffington Post, Politico, Business Insider, Deutsche Welle, CNN, International Business Times and, surprisingly, Ria Novosti. Each time, I lost out in the final round or was made an offer I couldn't accept. Each time, I was a stone throw away from literally everything I worked for these past years, only to realize it wasn't what I thought it would be. In the end, I started opening my horizon to new career ideas and I genuinely landed all jobs I applied for but two. It was evident, that "being a journalist in Germany above everything else" was no longer a smart model for my life, and once this realization made it into my head, I was getting opportunities I didn't know I could have. Here, too, my expectation for the year was not met, but exceeded hugely. On New Year's 2015 I thought I was heading back to school in the States, and now I'm back where it all started, how I had always hoped it would go when I was just a teenager.

Of course, a happy ending of 2016 for me personally does not translate into real life. All together I will never remember 2016 as a good year because the world changed for the worse. No other year I cried so much, but never for myself. I cried weeks for Brexit, then I cried weeks for Trump, and throughout I cried a lot watching and seeing and knowing that Aleppo, and all its people, was burning, and far beyond the confines of what was once a city, or a country. I skipped Christmas due to the incredible heartbreak over the world heading towards doom, by choice, and that I thought that 2016 would be, like all the other years, a year of progress and enhanced cooperation, and not a year in which hate crimes became trendy and being part of a multilateral world view was to be viewed as weakness, or even evil. I started the year being proud of my profession, and finish it knowing the world thinks I'm a liar due to my profession. Everything changed this year, and I, for as long as I live, will remember and say "I was there, I saw it coming!". Hopefully!

And as every year, I ask myself what I learned from the good and the bad, that makes even a bad year a good one in terms of experience. This year, I learned that things can go very well for yourself, and it means nothing if you can't share it. I had a wonderful year, full of great experiences, but it didn't make me happy because they were a result of my privilege that I did not deserve. My happiness does not guarantee me satisfaction, simply because I just don't have a heart that is able to shut the evil in this world out. Just like every other year, 2017 I am expecting huge changes, and unlike most years, they are welcomed because I have realized that they are the way forward. Jumping into the cold water, doing something wild, not thinking before doing, and other really hard to do things people try to avoid, just seem to be my style. I am relocating, I am changing career, and I am over the disappointments of 2016 which means 2017 will have an easy time teaching me new things. And that way, hopefully, 2016 with all its deaths and political catastrophes can hopefully remain a memory as soon as we have cleaned up the mess it made. That won't happen in 2017, but we hopefully have time... 

Why I'm Skipping Christmas In My Heart This Year.

The entire house is full of Christmas song and spirit. I work at the Christmas market, where the holidays are literally business. On top of that, I try to fit all my holiday watch list into my barely existing spare time. Heck, I even went to Disneyland. And yet, this year Christmas has not stood a chance in my heart. Before I continue, I should probably express how Christmas is much more than a holiday to me and that I usually start looking forward to it in August. It's just the time of love, family and peace, where we all remember to be kind, give gifts to those we love, and yes, we love, and then love more. And that is why this year I have now decided to skip Christmas: not in what I do, but in my heart. There will be a tree, but there won't be a celebration. After the year we had it simply doesn't feel right.

I was watching a carol show this morning, and some terrible singer lipsynced a call for "peace on Earth". And that is why I cannot identify with Christmas this year. In my lifetime a situation like Aleppo has not happened: live death on TV, the internet and absolutely nothing done to stop it. This season of peace is anything but. To feel Christmas spirit only means to turn off the TV and close the eyes to the most drastic suffering I have ever witnessed. How some people react to this senseless act of violence also rarely reminds me of what Jesus would have done or wants us to do. As a result, celebrating love, peace and the salvation we acquired by the birth of a man who, according to our belief system, grants us peace even after death but not those who are quite literally dying in front of our eyes as we speak, is wrong. It just doesn't feel right. And sure, our Lord has mercy, and yet I cannot help but overlook the paradox of Christmas and Aleppo happening at the same time.

To me, personally, that means that for the first time in my life I had to ask myself if it is at all tasteful to forget about what is happening and just focus on the good news of Christmas. I have never felt this good news to be threatened more than in 2016, and my subsequent answer was that allowing that Christmas sentiment into my heart would be a disrespect. I usually feel lucky and grateful for my privilege, but right now I am feeling uncomfortable about it. I don't deserve sitting here in the warmth, forgetting about the cruel world out there, pretending that love is what makes this world go around. It has never been more obvious that love does NOT conquer all, and that compassion and kindness are not today's trending topics. If that was true, we wouldn't have a Brexit to prevent immigrants from entering a country, a president-elect who openly hates people and appoints Putin's friends to government positions and, most importantly, war in more countries than currently not at war.

At a carol service earlier today, there they were: the privileged people, sipping their mulled wine while singing about how happy they are about Jesus being born despite not having gone to church in years and going by "atheism" to save taxes. At this point it is absolutely hilarious, or should I say mind-blowing, that quite a few people who are shaking their head about the people of Bethlehem not taking Mary and Joseph in on the night of Jesus' arrival are also suggesting to have a maximum quota on Syrians escaping wars to this country. A Protestant and a Catholic minister had also appeared to tell the Christmas story, tastelessly comparing the suffering of Aleppo to all of our personal battles that we just need to give up to God. As a person who has little time for religion, I struggle to just believe that God's salvation will benefit Aleppo. I think most people agree with me that human action would probably help a lot more.

But, and this is important, action was lacking big time. No American or UN action, or anything to counter Russian action which should never have happened. Gone are the days where this fight was about democracy. Anyone believing in democracy needs to be against Assad, although parties to put support in instead are of course very few in number. But whatever got us there, whoever really is the evil side, this human catastrophe was 100% preventable. I have a lot of very moronic friends who support Assad and still call themselves believers in freedom, undermining everything we see as propaganda. You know, the way almost every dictator in history got their following by simply undermining truths and appealing to emotions. And this year we have had so much of that. It has been easy to emotionalize people in the wake of more than one political failure, and considering that 2016 is possibly just the beginning of this downward spiral that will lead us out of our value system makes me feel anything but all tingly inside. Tingles, sure, but due to nausea.

And of course I am aware that Aleppo isn't the first, or even the worst, catastrophe there ever was around Christmas, but this time we are all watching. It is impossible to miss people posting their last messages to social media on Facebook, and despite Assad turning off the internet or mobile services in Aleppo, of course not everyone died there. On top of that, we also heard about wars before, haven't we? This one isn't any better than all the others we vowed to never allow to happen ever again. Christmas feels wrong all the time. In 2012, after Newtown, Christmas in my heart was a stretch as well. I was also in Israel where many things reminded me of how the world has forgotten about Jesus' legacy. I cannot have Christmas in my heart. There is no room in my heart this year. It is filled with grieve for the numbness, helplessness and negligence I feel about Aleppo. There is no silver lining for people seeking freedom and not getting it because the entire world had interests they wanted to see through. My personal interest is freedom for everyone, and so this is a dark Christmas, because we are heading towards less freedom globally, and 2k16 was likely just the beginning...

Everything about Disneyland is good but *these* things are even better...

After talking about my reoccurring dream of the past decade of being in Disneyland with time running out or attractions closing, and my rather elaborate blog on how I believe that I will fall in love with whoever takes me to Disneyland, I finally went to Disneyland last week. The mere fact I can write this without lying makes me very happy. I love, love, love Disneyland. Prior to the visit, I was prepared by friends that I might be disappointed: Disneyland is a place for children, and last time I went I sorta was one. So last week, for the first time in ten and a half years, I walked onto Main Street, USA in Disneyland and actually did what I had planned for a long time. Spoiler Alert: I was not disappointed. It would have been crazy for me to not love the experience. Yet, I of course managed to acquire some highlights, and I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t share them.

#Friendship

Every single boy I ever dated knew I had this dream of going to Disneyland. Each one of them promised to take me. None of them, for different reasons, followed through. Now that I went with my friends Camille and Tom I only have one thing to say about that: THANK F***! I have many cool places ruined by the fact I went there with the wrong, or at least no longer right, person. My lifelong dream of being in Moscow is now a distinctive memory of just one person, and I don’t enjoy thinking of what happened with him very much. I don’t think I could ever go back to my ex’s hometown in the Highlands without associating the place with him. Therefore, not making memories with the wrong guy in Disneyland is a win, I suppose. No corrupting places anymore! Instead, I now have memories with friends I’ve had for many years and who will, unlike these boys, never exit my life. I won’t ever regret association of Disneyland with Tom and Camille. And to have such friends, even after all those years of not being around each other, made it extra special.

Memories

Paradoxically, one of the reasons I love Disneyland so much is the set of memories I have from it which is the opposite of my prior argument. Disneyland Paris is the only place I remember vacationing with my father. I remembered him going on a high-speed, upside down roller coaster with his briefcase and taking a picture with Goofy, his favorite character. Then I remember my last visit in California, where the park shut for the public and allowed high school seniors to enter only. And finally, I remember that it had been a dream of mine to go to Disneyland as a child, and my mother only obliging when I was eleven. Back then, the robots in the Pirates ride were real AF. Now, the internet corrupted us and anything but CGI is a disappointment. The memories of thinking “whoaaaa, what a ride” however, aren’t going anywhere.

Diversity in a place so white even Trump would be shocked

Disneyland is not a very good representation of France these days. The moment I left the train station on my arrival I immediately noticed the diversity. I feel good in diverse places, in fact, I probably enjoy a society more if it features more than one color. Granted, Disneyland is a pretty white place. I consider it the most American place outside the US, and even in France the main audience was white, rich families, at least it seemed that way. However, I saw certain efforts to still illustrate some openness to all those white kids. “It’s a small world”, a boat ride through a room with dolls dancing from all over the world, had dolls of all color. My favorite, however, was the doll wearing niqab, dancing and singing with all the others. AWESOME! Additionally, one of the Elzas in the parade was Asian. FANTASTIC! Reflecting Disney’s worldview in present-day, Fillon-and-LePen-voting France, I suppose, isn’t the easiest feat, but at least they try.

Disneyland vs Reality

Just by fulfilling my dream of finally being back, my day at Disneyland was one of the best ones I had this year. It reminds me of past days, makes me dream of the future, and for a second I quite literally forgot I live in a terrible world because Disneyland is so awesome. People tell me every day how they just don’t watch the news anymore because it upsets them, or they don’t engage with hatred to protect their heart. Well, I’m not capable of that (and also believe that’s a wrong attitude) but on Disneyday, I succeeded in doing just that. Then, at 8pm, as the grand finale, Disneyland put on a laser show at the castle. The castle lit up with pictures of children singing and dancing around the world: in front of the Pyramids, in the Highlands, on the Great Wall of China. Then, suddenly, all lights went off, and the only thing visible was a huge projection of just one word: “Peace”. Since the end of "My Girl" I hadn't cried this much. We had just spent a whole day never once thinking of reality, and that’s ok sometimes, but the reality is out there, and it’s not peaceful. With goosebumps all over my body, this became my highlight of the entire day because Disneyland gave us a break but didn’t allow us to forget.

My Munich trips perfectly reflect everything that's wrong with Germany...

I’ve been to Munich four times in my life, and each time I mad a very similar experience. They say that the South is a friendly place, and I’m pretty sure if I ever got to stay longer that’s the experience I would make. Fact is, I never did stay long. I only ever stayed long enough to realize just how German Munich was. Anyone who’s read this blog before should know fully well what that means: order, efficiency, no surprises. The best part of the last two months I spent acclimatizing to this reality again after chaos, ridiculous inefficiency and nothing ever working out the way it was supposed to in Cairo. Two years of Egypt would make it pretty hard for anyone to accept living somewhere else again, and I chose to make that place Germany. As if it wasn’t underwhelming to me the first few times. It’s funny how each of my visits to Munich underlines exactly that: some sort of culture shock. But let me not tell you everything right away:

Visit #1: Oktoberfest 2006

The one and only time my hometown football club of Alemannia Aachen played the Bundesliga, me and my church friends couldn’t miss the chance to see them play Bayern Munich. Where does Bayern play? That’s right, Munich. So that’s where we went, to watch football, the most German thing anyone could ever do. I was 17 and hugely into Jesus, in fact staying the night at the priest’s residence for lack of any places in Munich to sleep all week because it was Oktoberfest time. What’s more German than football? That’s right, Oktoberfest. So right after the game which we obviously lost we headed to the tents. This was before ISIS in Europe, so it was crowded AF. Everyone was drunk. I hated beer. To set the precedent for my future life in Germany, it was this experience that I realized I had still not become the classic German. I had just returned from a year in the States, and my father had just passed away. And now this alcoholic hell was my life, and I didn’t drink. Oktoberfest looked fun to the person I would become, but back then it just showed me that maybe, Germany is not the right place for me to stay.

Visit # 2: Volleyball Club Trip 2010

Fast forward a few years and I had in fact left Germany again. I was living in the world’s best country in 2010, studying my absolute passion, being happier than I believe I ever was. My Volleyball Club traveled to Munich for a weekend of drinking, and I had become a drinker since my last visit. For the first time I was traveling as a Scottish university student but in my own country. I knew the language and the customs, and being in Munich there could not have been a bigger difference between the traits I had learned to love about the Scots and the complete opposite of that personified in the German people. We had the best time in all of Munich, and I mean it. No German had that much fun. Six years ago, as a completely different person from what I am now, I was ranting and ranting and ranting how boring those Germans are. Later on, I came to learn they’re not boring, they simply just don’t enjoy being like me, or the Scots, or the Americans for that matter. Silver lining: I was right where I was, in Scotland, and happy not to be in Munich.

Visit #3: Weird, weird job interview 2014

After uni and my PhD plans changing, I was applying Germany-wide. I didn’t want to stay in Germany but knew that the job market would probably only get worse if I left Germany. I was unemployed there, so I was going to be unemployed everywhere. What made matters worse was the incredible boredom of not having a job. Coupled with being in Germany, it was genuinely the worst time. I had a job interview at a PR firm in Munich so I thought “what the hell, why not?” and went for it. Within 10 minutes of being there I knew the job was history, however, I was still in Munich and thought my sister and I could have a good time. We couldn’t find decent döner which shouldn’t happen in any place in Germany. I also saw far less foreign people, which is never a good thing. When I then met up with my American friend Lindsey, and she told me how she was having trouble finding friends in Munich, I got an impression of where I was. I myself had met Lindsey one night in Slovenia, and we were friends the next day. How she could struggle was beyond me. But I knew of course what making friends in Germany entails, and so I just figured Munich, with all its rich, white people, probably wouldn’t be different than Aachen where I am from.

Visit #4: Working for Huff Post

This time I came as a completely new person. Nothing was left of those experiences before and my enthusiasm for Germany greatly changed after the four best words a German chancellor ever made: “We can do it”, speaking about the refugee crisis. Ever since, Germany has become a possibility for me to stay, which it never was. So when this opportunity arose it started sounding cool being close to the Alps and having a city job. It was redemption time. On day 1 I left the house at 7.30. A jogger past me as I left the hotel. At the corner I turned, a man with a dog past me. And at the traffic lights a couple was meeting up cheerily. The next day, I left the hotel at 7.30 again. At the exact same place as the day before, the jogger passed me. At the corner, there he was: the man with the dog. And finally the same couple met up at the same place as the day before. Three guesses what happened the day after. Same again! To the second! Nobody late! Everything predictable, after two days. This is the essence of Germany, and it’s hard to cherish after chaos and insanity sometimes worked out really well for me in Cairo. Now I wouldn’t prefer Egypt, but what happened to a healthy balance. Sometimes feeling like Germans aren’t robots would be nice…

Are we heading for "WAR"?

A German talking about a war, that's new. The kind of war I am talking about has, however, actually not been discussed in my country for a long time. I'm talking about war on ideology, disputes of thinking. I am not talking about bombs, explosions and enemies (yet!), but about closing in on a time period of history. When Francis Fukoyama said the "end of history" had been reached after the collapse of the Cold War, I believe, many people thought he was being ridiculous then. I remember reading "The End of History" for the first time in 2010 or 2011, believing then that a notion of liberal democracy having "won" when such a big part of the world hadn't conceded the "fight"yet, was pretty freaking ignorant. As of 2016, he was proven wrong: liberal democracy has definitely not won, but we are about to enter into the next phase of history. Does liberal democracy prevail? I believe we will only know after that fight has settled.

As a student of history, I had module classes divided into years: "Early Modern Europe: 1490 - 1870", Europe in Transition: 1870 - 1918", you get the picture. In the future, I believe modules will start with the year 2016, only the name is to be confirmed. It could be "The End of Liberal Democracy: 2016 - tbc" or "The Rise of Neo-Nationalism: 2016 - tbc". What's clear to me is that we will be talking about ideology for a long time to come. You may think that's not new, but it is. We might have been discussing ideology over a glass of wine and a bite of cheese before, we might have disagreed and then gone home and resumed our lives as if nothing had happened. I think these times are over. I think that soon it is but the only thing we can't ignore. We have already been proven to be unsuccessful in ameliorating our opponents, and the entire globe is en route to be divided by ideological reasoning once more.

Unlike the last times, each country now faces the same struggle to a stronger or lesser extent: the return of nationalism. All countries have had episodes of nationalism, and in most cases, it did not go too well. Because we assume human beings to be smart and logic, learning from history (what else would be the point of historical research otherwise?), we somehow expected that certain things would never again show up on the map. The slogan of ever holocaust memory is "never again", while Remembrance Day carries the words "lest we forget". Those words are under threat of being completely and utterly forgotten, and mistakes have a high potential of being repeated. That is not to say that only nationalism will carry us to doom once more, but many of the threats to the future could be prevented if proper lessons would be learned from the past, and for example Fukoyama's ignorance about having reached the ultimate world view that will never ever change again had been debunked just a bit more in time.

The war we are facing, therefore, is not one fought in battles; it will be in homes, at workplaces and, most importantly, on the internet. Here I am in 2016, thinking it will be impossible that an ethnic cleansing could happen on Western soil because I thought there was dedication to not let that happen again by EVERYONE, and yet there is a Muslim registry about to become part of the law in the country that leads the, now so called, free world. Those who stand up for the conviction that this development is wrong, which in my eyes it clearly is, will face the front even among their friends. The camps we now have are those who believe in the progress of history, the resilience of liberal democracy and a common understanding that we need and want to cooperate, and those who oppose all this, seeking new approaches, albeit not necessarily feasible ones, to solve problems they perceive as being brought on by politicians, journalists or, worst, people simply different from themselves. For the latter camp, the bridge between such a political view and racism and xenophobia is unfortunately not very hard to cross.

There is a war coming between these camps. Just like Capitalists vs Communists in the Cold War, Muslims vs Christians in the Ottoman Empire and the South vs the North during the American Civil War, each side is made a villain that is simply wrong, although there is nothing but a conflict of interests and two different approaches to solving a single problem. Neither capitalists nor communists have won the Cold War since both of these groups still exist in this world, yet they saw each other as an ideological nemesis and just one rose above the other by power. The divide between liberals and conservatives is the same. Each camp accuses the other of the same mistakes, eg. lying, ignorance and abuse of power. The fact that there is such a thing as "the truth" that can support or refute these claims does not seem to matter anymore. And this reality wasn't there last year. We are now fighting our friends and family, and I consider it the right thing considering the racism, bigotry and misogyny coming out of the "opposite" team occasionally.

And that's why I believe the fight the internet has been calling out since last week is in fact coming. A wise, wise man once said "soon we will have to choose between what is right, and what is easy", and in my life time that has never applied. I always wondered who I would have been in 1939 Germany: a passive onlooker, a Jew-hiding ideologist or a Nazi? I always knew I wouldn't have been a Nazi but I questioned if I would have rose up, hell, even be a Sophie Scholl maybe. Today, I know the answer because I will most likely have to make that decision soon. Will I look out for myself, hide in my own life, care about me and my family, or will I stand up and say no to those who are, in my world view, destroying what my forefathers built for me although most likely I will not have any disadvantages personally by any scenario. Germans have not had to ask themselves these questions in a long time. We agreed on liberal democracy. We agreed we got lucky, and we rebuilt what we destroyed. And now, we are going to have to fight those who want to do it again. And because I believe in defending our amazing progress, equality and idealism with as much heart as I have for it, I now know why people, then and today, voluntarily go to war, because I'd do it, too. For all that. 

I'm Not Mad At Donald Trump, I'm Mad At America!

Before I dive head first into this post which will no doubt displease many people, including many people I love very much, I need to probably say one thing: Political ideas shouldn't end friendships or incite conflict. And in my opinion, political ideas don't do that at all. I am from the liberal camp, as most of my generation especially outside of the States, but part of that means also being confronted with lots of people who think differently, and it has never been a major problem. The reason it is now a problem is not because "we" are "losing", it's because we thought we were on a path towards a better world, and in our understanding we have just been proven wrong although there was no indication we'd have to realize that. So what I am hoping, for the sake of this divide ever to stop again, is an open mind. I realize I don't need to sway votes. It's too late for that. All I hope to do over the next 4 years is explain to you, the people who aren't terrified just now, why we are!

I mean, how privileged does one have to be to just
not vote at all, considering people died for them to have that right?

I want to start off with just a scenario. For the sake of hypotheticals I am going to assume I understand all of your reasons for voting Trump/ Pence. So the next day, when half of America was in tears, you assumed it was a normal reaction: they lost, you thought, and they are scared of losing the horrible grip they had on the country for 8 years. You then remember the year 2000 when the exact same thing happened: people voted for Gore, but your guy won, and it made people very, very angry. Let me tell you that this time that's very different. So even if all this applies, were you wondering for one second why black people, women, and Muslims, to name a few, were actually terrified? I'm saying scared, not unhappy. Did you think this was an overreaction? The voting statistics show that a very large number of the people I just named had a different preference, and I am just wondering if you, as a Trump voter, who is likely not a disadvantaged minority or haven't experienced your disadvantages fully, asked yourself why an election result would make people question their safety.

By talking to Trump voters for over a year I heard some convincing arguments. Safety is of course a nice one, and to those who voted for him because they feel unsafe in the US I genuinely have nothing nice to say as that is a level of privilege I cannot fathom. But there are more reasons: Not everyone believed Putin is a maniac we should oppose. This might be a good policy decision for peace, but it is definitely not right. Vladimir Putin has no respect for international law and various freedoms mentioned in the US Constitution. Saying that appeasing him would be a good idea is not wrong, but it's the same as accepting authoritarianism for safety: definitely prudent, but just not right. The same goes for the notion of illegal immigration that some people based their vote on. Of course, even liberals can understand the frustration of feeling like jobs go to people with no "right" to be in the country. But then again I would like to ask what people see when they see the first sentence of the Declaration of Independence. It is not my intention to make anyone feel bad about their choices, yet I truly believe that citizens who are closing their eyes from needs, even of those who don't share their citizenship, are mocking Thomas Jefferson's ideas.

Historically, of course, there is plenty to say. The USA is a white country, founded by former rebels who came from the whitest place on this planet. Yet, over the last 200 years, the US has become the number one in the world, surpassing the power of their former white original state, by accepting people to be part of it who aren't white. Every American, white or black, female or male, knows that the greatness of America lies in its diversity. The moment a democratic election chooses to acknowledge a man who has openly expressed to those not desperate enough to see it that America does indeed have a preference in race, and even gender and religion, the progress of these last two centuries is taking a step back. Now you might be white, Christian and male, so why would you care, right? Women are definitely not equal in present day America, and women should know that, but sometimes they don't. Black people are not equal and crime rates can prove that. Religious freedom is often compromised for those who have been vilified, most notably Muslims. Yet, many of these minorities saw in a man who has often insulted them the better option, and I wonder how that could happen based on the fact that Donald Trump never did anything to appeal to them, while his opponent did for 30 years.

I don't get it, and I likely won't. The hate for Hillary was stronger than the desire to vote for someone who hasn't insulted minorities, and I'm scratching my head but so be it. Many called it the choice between Pest and Cholera, to which even if I had agreed I always said "you choose cholera, come on, of course you choose cholera!" Especially in this contest I find the analogy rather fitting because cholera knocks you out, really freaking sucks but you survive with a certainty of up to 90%. The pest nearly wiped out all of Europe a few centuries ago. Its highly contagious and means your most certain death, having a survival rate of up to 5%. I am truly hoping that Donald Trump won't kill us all, and I don't think he will, but he is definitely the pest. His rhetoric being rewarded with the presidency now means that it's perfectly okay to speak like that. I heard it being called the end of political correctness, and people seem to like that idea. That political correctness merely saved gay people from openly being called fags and black people the n-word goes without saying. Yeah, well these days are over. To me, this legitimized hatred is truly, genuinely the pest. It makes me sick!

Whoever does that is an asshole, but they now feel like they're
good to go with this behavior since America voted:
being a dick is fine!

So I'm just wondering if people considered this because I have talked to many Republicans, and they usually agreed that this is unacceptable because, you know, Republicans are not shit people. However, when asked how something like these hostile attitudes towards minorities most of us are part of would affect their vote, I usually just got "but I really just hate Hillary!" The media was also quick to be blamed which empirically just cannot be a legitimate reason  since opposition of a candidate on this scale is almost impossible even in dictatorships. I'm sure everyone has heard about populism now, and nobody seems to have looked up what it means. Meanwhile, the same people are now saying "we should give President Trump a chance", and these are the same people who told me as a teenager to not take crap from boys and respect myself. Why should I give a man a chance who has limited me to my appearance, believes I can't do the same job a man does just as well, and suggested that my pussy is something he is entitled to because he is a celebrity. Trust me, I know plenty of these boys (not using "men" here on purpose) and you know what I did? I dumped their ass. I didn't make them my friend, boyfriend or husband, never mind my President. Why is it so easy for his voters to look past that?

My genuine interest lies in trying to understand. The majority of my friends in the States voted Trump, and I still love these people just as much. Since I am seeking the conversation, and have already changed my mind many times on different attitudes, I was hoping to hear answers that matter, but where is the explanation that Mexicans vote for a guy who has called them all, collectively, "rapists" in his first ever speech? Why do women vote for a man who loves the patriarchy? How are people who are not racist or minorities themselves allow for their friends who are to now feel like they are not welcome? I am a woman, so I guess I have some insights into being mocked by the President-Elect, but I find his supporters' attitudes towards black and Muslim people even worse, and that has nothing to do with me. I dislike he is trying to take away the right for women to decide about their bodies because I'm a woman, but I also don't appreciate that the while, male Christian guy DT calls his running mate believes his rights need more protection than a Muslim's. If that's what you believe, you are nose-deep in privilege and Jesus would likely love for you to show some humility.

So I truly couldn't care less about President Trump; it's those people who scare me. I am aware that the vast majority of people who read this and voted for him would agree with me that racism, discrimination and xenophobia are bad attributes, but I don't think all of you have looked deep down if you are definitely not at least a little bit infected with these. I'm talking to Democrats, too. If my candidate would be the subject of black churches burning, Klu Klux Clan celebrations and gay people's cars being smeared, I would, at the very least consider, how this happened? Liberals don't hate Republicans; it's the willingness to close one's eyes from the threats to progresses made towards equality in the last century. I get that baby boomers want the past back, so do I. I'd love the 90s back. I'd love it. But we are talking about an easier time for US, you and me, the privileged people, not the world. If America comes first, that means that everyone else will be second, and that's an attitude you cannot expect anyone to be okay with. President Trump will see this soon enough because I don't think he's an idiot (just an asshole), but it's the voters that need to realize it. They might not have executive power, but they have the power to make our survival here on Earth pleasant, and elevating your problems over those directly and indirectly connected to you is a really freaking crappy quality.

After half a week of watching, reading and trying to understand everything, I found Seth Meyers to have the best words because it's positive, yet not Jimmy Fallon naive or neglectful that something terrible just happened. Most Trump voters would not watch this anymore because they believe this to be part of the establishment (when I'd say "maybe you just want to consider we, the "establishment", actually made a decision at the end of a long, fact-based thinking process") but trust me, my three days of crying were not coming from "losing". In fact, I "lost" in my own country in every election I ever participated in, and I never cried. It's coming from thinking America was more than a place for scared, privileged people. I thought I was finally going to see a woman president, decades after we had one in Europe. And with that, I'd hope you actually consider Seth Meyers' words... 

Why #ImWithHer - An Ode To Hillary Clinton

On November 4, 2008, I was in Chicago, watching a black man walk on a stage in Grant Park to accept the US nation’s decision for him to be the 44th President of the United States. No eye remained dry as people knew that what had just happened was extraordinary: no other black man had ever been able to do what Barack Obama did that night! I am not black, and could never attempt to comprehend what that meant for the black community of the US. Then, I knew that a minority had become the most powerful man in the world, and even without belonging to that minority, that fact touched my heart and made me feel like this biased, sometimes cruel world had made a huge step towards progress. This year, on November 8, 2016, I will potentially grasp what that night in 2008 meant to black people: A woman could be up on that stage, again for the first time, and make another of these huge steps for the world possible.

I am not black, but I am a woman. Coming from an all-girls Catholic private school, I didn’t fathom why being a woman would put me in minority status: I was really good at all subjects, especially physical education, and I was getting all the things boys could have, at least as far as I could observe. Only after school it finally dawned on me I had been protected from reality. In that reality, I am not equal, I can do less things physically than a man and I do not always get the same thing boys get, at least at the same price. As much as I can never understand what discrimination against a skin color feels like despite my experiences with reverse racism in Kenya, no man will ever be able to tell me what discrimination against my sex feels like. It doesn’t feel good! It feels unfair and it is unfair. It feels wrong and it is indeed very wrong most of the time. So for a woman to become the most powerful person in the world, whether she’s a crook or not, will be good for women, if only in symbolic terms. Period!

I can make a valid case for Hillary Clinton to become the next US President without even having to mention her catastrophic opponent. In fact, I have been doing just that as I have endorsed Hillary Clinton for the gig since November 5, 2008. Obama was fantastic, and my narrow first choice, the last time around. But for me, it was always going to be Hillary next. One day, not even a long time ago, I watched her defend her choice to oppose gay marriage in the past, and I heard her say “I was wrong!” Just like me, there were days when Hillary did not see the necessity for gay marriage, and through exchange and consideration she had, just like me, changed her mind. To me this character trait was more worth than her past disapproval. Unlike her reputation of being a robot, I felt that Hillary had there and then proved that she was a human being. One who fails sometimes. Unlike many, however, she had the strength to admit it, too.

Throughout the democratic campaign, I was with her. Bernie Sanders caught my attention but, being a political scientist who simply knows that the influence Hillary had been working to gain for 30 plus years would not be challenged by a revolutionary, even in a democratic system, was palpable throughout. Bernie would have been great for the US, but the US President has a big challenge that most people just simply forget: Congress! Unfortunately, being an effective president has nothing, or little, to do with finding out what the people want and making it possible. The moment the election is over it is about Congress, influencing it to think that what you, the individual, wants is what’s best for everybody. Bernie, a fella so far left from almost every single person in Congress, would have hit a freaking wall. Hillary, on the other side, played this game for decades. Sister knows how to influence people, how to maneuver through the Washington elites and who to call when something big needs to happen. Funnily enough, that behavior exactly earned her the villain status.

It’s true: an effective politician usually doesn’t wear a white jacket. Bernie fought many fights I admire way more than I admire any fights fought by Hillary, and certainly her opponent, but Hillary has already proven to make a difference whereas no other candidate running had the platform to show that they actually can do that. Sometimes, her work had quite the negative by taste which certainly applies to her Middle Eastern policy which left much to be desired. But Hillary, unlike any other candidate, was not only part of an actual presidential administration before, she was also married to the President. There is arguably no other person on this planet who knows this job better than Hillary. And yes, in all these years there have been incidents that are not amusing about Hillary, I, myself, have made mistakes in fewer years w

ithout making them up at all. Not all of Hillary’s steps were missteps. Those expecting somebody to do a job for 30 years without failures are, quite frankly, idiots. Now it boils down to a job being up for grabs and there being the choice of somebody who has never done as much as an internship n the role and someone who is the epitome of qualification. That’s the choice this year.

And yet, Hillary’s path to the White House was so damn tough that I could never have done it. Injustice like Midwestern women calling me incapable of being commander-in-chief because I have uncontrollable hormones and my opponent, and former friend, publicly accusing me of only being with my husband, who caused me so much pain but who I just love and sacrificed almost everything for, for political gains only would have broken me. And this lady listens to it, doesn’t blink, and barely ever hit back on the same level. And that despite her emotional, female temperament. I have been a Hillary fan for over a decade now, and even as a young girl of 14 I thought that one day this lady was going to be President even before I actually realized that being a woman one CANNOT do whatever a man can do. Today is this day, and I can’t wait because it will most likely change my life, and that of half the people on this planet: women!