FIRST
LETTER: LOOKING FORWARD
How do feel yourself French if you are German?
Can you change the feeling of belonging to a group
with who you share your social identity?
Everybody was worn and grow up somewhere. Everybody
has grown up expressing their own ideas and feelings by using a language, the
mother tongue one. Every nation uses a common language which is different from
others. This peculiar way of expression brings out the possibility of
understanding with others who speak it as well it mediates communication
between people and influences their way of being in contact. That is the reason
why we share with our nation a way of saying, thinking, feeling and doing which
makes ourselves different. Furthermore a nation is not a group of people
speaking the same language. Talking Chinese or English as an international way of
communication does not make French people, Russians or Germans to become a
nation. A nation is a group of people who share a mother tongue, culture and
history. Sometimes even dreams and wills, as my nation, Catalonia.
This article is addressed to all the ones born in
Germany, who share a language, culture and a part of their history that would
like to forget.
Since I am living here in Germany, there is something
I am sure about: the historical conscience of a nation is transferred from
generation to generation, every son, every daughter, every grandson or
granddaughter keeps it deeply inside. In Germany, children and grandchildren of
Nazis, instead of keeping their historical conscience, they carry it and deal
with it the best they can. That is, badly. It is really sad to see how innocent
people carry the weight of a guilt that does not belong to them. They bear with
the heavy weight of embarrassment from their ancestors.
I would like to talk about these two generations born
after Nazism (my husband belongs to the first one and my son to the second
one). Adults have been born with the problem of assimilating lots of questions
that have not been cleared up. They have been taken in by a society that started
again as a democratic nation where tolerance and respect for human rights are
essential premises for relationships. They are also characterized by their critical
spirit, the need of having their own opinion, the deep analysis of the reality
that surrounds them, good organization and over all, the dignity of deserving all
trust. Among other characteristics we can also point out: their responsibility
and the desire of well done things. Their children have a social framework
which prioritizes their welfare and wants them to have good principles,
offering them the completest moral, intellectual, musical and sports education
available.
Nowadays German society believes and lives in the democracy.
The social task that has been developed until these days deserves the approval
of many liberal countries. This well done job, from then to nowadays, is also
part of their history, because the history of a nation is been written by
everybody day by day. The German people, with their democratic attitude, offer
a new historical conscience to their descendent, in order to provide their
children’s grandchildren a good memory. A great present: help them to feel well
for belonging to their nation.
As a Catalan resident myself in Germany for thirteen
years, I am surprised and worried because most German people do not know a word
of my nation. I hope, once they have all the information, they can assume the responsibility
of standing up in order to avoid the antidemocratic attitude of the Spanish
people. It could be that Spain became a nation by adding several conquered
countries (Catalan Countries, Basque Country, North Africa and America) to the
Kingdom of Castile. But being a nation does not mean you have the right to ride
roughshod over others.
The Spanish government has subjugated all the
conquered cultures, they have tried to make them disappear, they have exploited
and plundered them, they have imposed Spanish language, as “The language of the
Kingdom” and nowadays they keep on with an inacceptable attitude for all
democratic countries. I am convinced myself that German nation is one of them.
PS: Thanks to the support, solidarity, tolerance and
respect of the Manager of my son’s Secondary School, we were able to fly
together to Barcelona on September 11th and demonstrate, together with
our family, friends and over million and a half Catalans in favor of the
independence of our nation. The sound of our songs, our wish of freedom and
justice filled up the streets of the “Ciutat Comtal” of Barcelona. Parents
carrying their children up their shoulders or pushing then on the buggies, old people
on wheelchairs, banners, “estelades” (Catalonia’s national flag) everywhere… a million
hearts, full of hope and conviction. All of this spread over the streets of our
home, because the Catalan nation believes in democracy and wants to be in peace
and free.
I really do hope that one day my son can raise a German
flag, as high as possible and with the same happiness is his heart as he did in
Barcelona last September 11th with the “estalada”. Much more, I hope that one day, without any embarrassment
neither pain, he can raise one flag with each hand, because his heart belongs
to two nations: the German one and the Catalan one. We, the older, will keep
fighting in order to give him lots of reasons to feel proud for being who he is
and the way he is.
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