Category Archives: life, the universe and everything else

Cose che mi vengono in mente e non stanno bene in nessuna categoria, ma in qualche modo c’entrano

A system working as intended: appreciation for the Belgian authorities in charge of asylum applications

I have a story that I feel needs to be shared. It happened three weeks ago, and made me proud to be Belgian.

A friend – I will call her Caroline – got in touch after a silence of several years. We used to work together back in the day, and had become friends. We had stayed in touch, very irregularly, through a common friend, who, like me, lives in Brussels. Caroline herself, who lived in the US when we worked together, was now back to France.

She had another former colleague, a man I will call Malik. Malik is Palestinian, and lives in Gaza with his wife and two children, 4 and 3 years old. You can see where this is going. His house was bombed, twice. His immediate family was unharmed, though some of his nephews, that used to play with his children, are gone.

Malik managed to get his family into Egypt via Rafah. Thanks to Caroline’s invitation, he obtained a tourist visa for the family to travel to the USA. With her help, he tried to obtain political asylum in the USA and Canada. But nothing worked. At the end of the customary three months, the visa was about to expire. So, Caroline’s message told us “Malik has decided to apply for refugee status in Belgium. Can you help?”

It turned out we could, a little bit. Mostly with information, and by giving him someone that he could call, a friendly voice in the New Place.

So in they flew, Malik and his wife and their two children, with a stopover in Brussels and a connecting flight to Cairo. They had a plan, supported by information we could find on the Belgian end: intentionally miss the flight to Cairo, then report to the airport authorities and ask for asylum.

It turns out that Belgium has an “airport track” for asylum seekers, and that it becomes very fast when minor children are involved. Malik and his family were first made to wait, and yes, after a long flight from the US and with two small children that’s not a joke.

But at the end of that wait, the system kicked into gear. The family was put into a car and driven to a building in the airport’s region. They were given the keys to an apartment, some money to buy food and information on where to buy it, and told to get some rest.

As the weekend came around, my girlfriend, who had taken point on the whole Malik initiative, went to meet the family and accompany it on a trip to Antwerp.

The trip was, she reports, very touching. They had a story to tell, and they wanted to tell it. They had photos on their phones: a house shot to pieces. Toys retrieved from the rubble. The missing cousins of the children, who they will never see again (though they have not been told that yet).

But check this out: they had an appointment with the Federal agency which processes asylum requests for the intake interview on the following Monday, less than one week after arrival!

The interview went something like this: the whole family had their photos and biometrics taken and was issued ID cards. After which, the official in charge basically told them: look, the situation is clear. You are from Gaza and cannot go back. Your status as refugee is straightforward and we might not even bother with a second interview. Welcome to Belgium. Here is information about your rights and the support that come with refugee status. See you in five years when you apply for citizenship.

The language was no doubt more formal (I was not there), but that was the gist of it.

It’s going to be difficult for them. Malik is a highly qualified professional, but the truth is many Belgian landlords do not like to rent to refugees. He and the family will have to learn French or Dutch to function in society. But this, by the Gods, is the asylum system working as intended. Belgium is a member state of the United Nations, which voted to adopt the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 (Belgium voted in favour). So, it is now beholden to it, and that implies offering safe haven to Malik and his family. No ifs, no buts. This is honorable.

And meanwhile my cohousing group is trying to make this a softer landing for the family. Since the group organizes some social event, it is easy to act as a sort-of-peer group for the adults while they find their feet.

Also, someone is organizing a Sinterklaas visit for their children, and maneuvers are in place to involve Malik’s little monsters.

(Because Belgium, we do not care for Santa Claus, and have our own version)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinterklaas

And look, the gods know that Belgium can be gleefully dysfunctional and infuriating at times. Look up “Belgian solution” and you’ll see what I mean. And the Belgian government is so blasé about dysfunctionality that it makes it own jokes about the Belgian government. But underneath it all, there are (some) functioning bureaucracies, and some simple just doing the bloody job, ESPECIALLY if your job is standing up for the underdog and the people in need.

And here, I have to say, I am having a bit of a patriotic moment, and am proud of the country where I chose to make my own stand, and of my fellow Belgians. I was never happier and prouder to have become one of you. Let’s keep doing this. Laten we dit blijven doen. Continuons comme ça. <3

Three things I learned from Luís Sepúlveda

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Luís Sepúlveda (to his friends “Lucho”, an endearing name for someone called Luís, that also means “I fight” in Spanish) crossed the path of Modena City Ramblers (the band I co-founded) as part of a group of writers, all of them Hispano-Americans: Paco Ignacio Taibo II, Daniél Chavarría, Leonardo Padura, Rolo Díez. This group, that called itself La Banda (The Gang) taught us three things.

The first: it isn’t over until it’s over. In those years (late 1990s), Italy was being normalized: the Clean Hands era had come to an end without the renewal we had been hoping for, and society seemed to have sank into a swamp of immobility. These authors had suffered defeats much more sever than our own (Lucho himself, an opposer to the Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, had been tortured in the regime’s prisons; Rolo had been shot in the back, and lived with a bullet lodged near his spine). But they appeared to be immune to the discouragement and negativity that affected us Italian: they just picked themselves up, dusted off, and went right back into the fray, even more enthusiastic than before.

The second: be a team. Beyond the different styles and sensitivities, the components of La Banda leaned on one another, supported each other. The group was a real resource for all its components. Their altruism and team spirit was inspiring. The group to which we naturally belonged, the sort-of-famous, sort-of-alternative Italian rock bands of the time, showed no such spirit. On the contrary, it was often ripples by petty rivalries.

The third: there is much joy in shared work for a meaningful cause. These authors were cheerfull, optimistic, positive people, despite often troubled personal histories: persecution, exile, prison, torture. In 1999, with my band, I traveled to Gijón, in Spain, where Lucho had settled down, to celebrate his 50th birthday. His trajectory would have warmed any heart: from Pinochet’s jails to the safety of Spain, the love of his beloved (she, too, a former prisoner of the Chilean regime), literary and commercial success. Most components of La Banda were there, to celebrate him and the path they all shared. I watched them sit over dinner, exchange funny and terrible memories, call each other “compañero de toda la vida”, bringing a hand to their heart. They expressed strong, sincere feelings, with a wink and a nod to the stereotype of the sentimental South American. And I thought: these are good lives. I, too would like a life like theirs.

These three lessons have stayed with me. They have been a common legacy of the Modena City Ramblers experience, for as long as I stayed in the band. Later, I brought them with me into my current life as a “mutant” social entrepreneur. Fight for a worthy cause, with a group of people you love and admire, and even a small chance of winning: if it not the recipe for happiness, it’s close. Close enough.

Ave atque vale, Lucho. You fought well. I hope that, at the end, people will be able to say the same of us all.

R.I.P. Luís Sepúlveda, 1949-2020

Home, again

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In 2019, I completed the process of acquiring Belgian nationality. I had started it the year before, in recognition of the fact that it looks like I am going to stay in my beloved Brussels for the long haul, and in an effort to insulate myself from any bad Brexit-like idea Italian politicians might have. It was no big deal: a bit of bureaucracy, a couple of hundred euro, and the Belgian administrative machine was in motion.

The months passed. And then a few weeks ago, I received a surprise invitation from the mayor of Forest (one of the 19 Brussels communes, the one where I live). He was delighted that some of its foreign residents – myself included – had recently acquired the Belgian nationality. Would I go out to the city hall for a moment of conviviality with him and his colleagues? I RVSP’ed sure, what a nice idea. And tonight, I went.

I was expecting a formality. A short and generic speech from some mayoral underling, followed by some kind of refreshment. I was wrong.

The whole political level of the city government was there. The mayor, and six of the nine échevins, in all their multi-ethnic glory. Nobody was in a rush. They went out of their way to explain that the city hall’s employees, and they personally, were there for the citizens, and that all doors were always open. When a lady reported problems with finding affordable housing, they all stepped up, explaining what each one’s office could do to attack her problem. Local government, at its best.

But it was the humanity of it all that stroke me the most. They seemed genuinely interested in talking to each one of us individually, and delighted that we had chosen Forest as our (permanent, given we had applied for citizenship) home. They even seemed to like us.

People liked them right back. Several new Belgians stood up to acknowledge the quality and humanity of the services they had received, as foreigners first, as Belgians now. One lady beaming, announced that she used to work black, but now her citizen status opens new opportunities. Everyone laughed, and the mayor smiled and said he was sorry she had to do that, and happy that now she was in the clear.

It turned out that Forest has 56,000 inhabitants representing 144 nationalities. In 2019 alone, about 500 residents, like me, acquired the Belgian nationality. These are incredible numbers, that expose the lies about the “migration emergency”, the “invasion”. Over half of Brussels residents were not born Belgian (source). And yet here we are, with our mayor welcoming us to the large, colorful, slightly shady Brussels family (yes, shady, since our cultural heroes are people like these – and proud of it!).

Way to go, my fellow Belgians. No, this country is not perfect. It can be quite dysfunctional. But these things are fixable. What matters most to me, is the ironic, tender humanity you so often manage to infuse in life here. If this is Belgium, I am happy to have chosen to make my home here, and proud to be one of you.