German quirks from an Afghan perspective

In 2016, when Afghan writer Taqi Akhlaqi boarded a plane from Kabul to Germany to take up a scholarship at the Heinrich Böll House in Langenbroich near Düren, he had packed with him a certain set of expectations and a considerable German vocabulary. He had been learning German at the Goethe Institute since 2012 to read Nietzsche in the original. “Thus Spoke Zarathustra” had been a life-changing book. While his best friend would often recite from the Quran, Akhlaqi tended to confuse those around him by quoting Nietzsche. 

In Germany, he thought, everyone reads and quotes Nietzsche. Wouldn’t that be great! He was disappointed to find that hardly anyone in Germany was even familiar with Goethe beyond a cursory classroom reading. Akhlaqi, who was 30 at the time, tried not to get too annoyed by this, or by the German cities that all somehow look the same, the absurd abundance of choice in German supermarkets (he approached the local palate through a range of ready-meal experiments), the strange washing detergent smell of German people, and the Kafkaesque labyrinth of the German railway system. 

Sitting in Böll’s study, he tried in vain to make progress with his novel. In the end, he postponed the project and wrote about his acute culture shock instead. The result is the book “Versteh einer die Deutschen” (Surely someone must understand the Germans), which was published in the summer and translated into German by Jutta Himmelreich in her typically exquisite style. Following the German-Persian short story collection “Aus heiterem Himmel” (Out of the blue), this is his second publication in Germany, where he has found a new home in Berlin. 

In the end, as was already apparent after four months at the Böll House, Akhlaqi learned to love the country, though there were many stumbling blocks—from the uncomfortable toilets and beds, to the anxious looks that Germans constantly gave him due to the vague fear of someone who looks like a Muslim. He encountered prejudice and a variety of judgemental behaviours that, for whatever reason, Germans seem to greatly enjoy.

That’s one side of it. On the other side, he observed enormous support for refugees, especially in 2016, and a certain appreciation for the individual human being, which was something he had never experienced in this form. In Afghanistan, individualism is a fairly marginal idea, and privacy a completely foreign concept, as many larger families live under one roof and sleep in the same room. The counterpoint to this—isolation—was something Akhlaqi struggled with at first. It was a blessing when a Syrian and an Iraqi colleague moved into the Böll House and the three of them turned it into a classically picturesque writers’ flatshare tucked away in the countryside between the fields, forests and apple trees. 

Forced into the role of Afghanistan expert

Akhlaqi didn’t spend the entire four months at the writing retreat. He travelled a lot, visiting cities across the country, giving readings and speaking at schools. It was an enriching experience on the one hand, bit on the other, he experienced what almost every author who visits Germany from a crisis region experiences. Everyone—audiences, discussion moderators, journalists—wanted to ask him about the political and security situation in his homeland. Books, Akhlaqi’s work, or his thoughts on German literature, were only discussed in passing. “No matter how often I brought up the terms ‘writer’ or ‘author of short stories’ loudly and audibly, the questions always revolved around politics and security, which forced me to adopt the role of Afghanistan expert,” he writes. 

On a personal level, the topic of security certainly shaped his perception of Germany. The experience of being able to move around without fear and constant tension, to simply go for a relaxed walk, was new to him, and it took time to get used to it. In Kabul, he says, you don’t leave the house without taking a piece of paper with the name, blood group and telephone numbers of close relatives, hoping that it won’t be burned in an explosion. 

Akhlaqi has experienced several suicide attacks, he’s had friends killed by terrorists and has seen dead bodies on the street. That is just one reason, but probably the most important reason, that people called him insane when he initially wanted to return to Kabul after four months in North Rhine-Westphalia. But after all, his wife and two sons were still living there. It is hardly surprising that throughout the book, one wish shines through again and again: for an Afghanistan without the Taliban, without terror, without violence and fear. 

This book successfully deals with these topics without letting them dominate. There’s much to learn here about Afghanistan, and even more about everyday life in Germany, including its strange quirks, as viewed form the outside. It’s an enjoyable and enlightening read. The outside perspective it offers is one that’s needed more often in Germany, if only because it might allow us to appreciate the advantages of living in a free democracy, and to not take everything else so seriously. 

Taqi Akhlaqi 
„Versteh einer die Deutschen“ 
Sujet Verlag, Bremen 2024 
Translated from Persian by Jutta Himmelreich 
275 pages
19,80 Euro (softcover with dust jacket)   

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