I am an immigrant

I thought about this as I got on public transportation last Friday night. My train came within five minutes, clean and reliable. And as I walked the three blocks from the stop to my apartment - at midnight, alone, and with no worries about my safety - I realized that Germany has been good to me.

Call me an ex-pat if you are an American, but to a German I am merely a foreigner, an immigrant. I have more in common with the Indian shop owner or the Korean music student than I do with the people who live downstairs.

Now is a time when many countries (not just Trump's America) are trying to close their doors, and 'immigrant' is becoming a dirty word. And as much as I have maligned Germany in this blog (though usually with a sense of humor or a tongue in my cheek) I have never felt threatened here.


I'm not saying that my experience is the same as that of Syrian refugees or third-generation Turks here in Germany. But that's the point - immigrant is a big word and immigrants have a world of different experiences. Speaking just for me (which I think we agree is quite enough after more than five years of blogging), I am one of the lucky ones.