I learned: politics is all about how to spend your recourses. And – at least in the German model – to stick to some assumed combination of integrity, transparency and emotional readiness (Volksgeist). Otherwise people will tear you apart. In my personal list of “Relevant Things”, nationality sits pretty much on the periphery. It hardly exists. I do sweep in-between bubbles, I feel connected to Berlin, not Germany, grounded in Tel Aviv, not Israel, gravitated by Cairo, Teheran, Beirut, not so much the rest. I’d never call myself a patriot, maybe just in one sense: I empathise and promote places that surprise me, places that prevent me from becoming a real patriot: Someone who believes in a hierarchy of places, someone whose range of experience equals the digits on my bank account statements last month (before my cell-phone-company threatened to close my account). Still: I write about politics. Sometimes it’s an act of humiliation, but it feels necessary. Writing has a declarative aspect: When I write, I release myself: obnoxious fantasies, despicable dreams, human flaws. Now I do want to write about Hitzelspergers courage, I want to reflect upon the significance of Sharons life & death (in fact there would be some intimate details to tell details regarding his foster-daughter), or the fact, that smuggling sperm from an Israeli prison and conceiving a child in Gaza is a juicy way of interrupting an economic, geographic and social occupation. A bold assumption from my side: Maybe writing about politics is sometimes less about the concrete things, but more about the writers fancy and flaws: like a sublimated remorse; a bad conscience for, if you understand politics as mentioned above, I am not even politcal.