An Ode to My Hometown and How It Feels to Go Back After Not Having Lived There Over Three Years

Ann Arbor, Michigan is a place, the place, to which my sense of home is most closely tied. I grew up in Ann Arbor from the day I was born until the age of nineteen, when I moved away to start college in Beloit, Wisconsin. It’s the place where my sense of what home means in general and specifically to me were first developed.

A year after I started college, my family moved away from Ann Arbor to St. Louis, Missouri, and since then, I have not felt whole. I felt extremely connected to Ann Arbor, especially after reevaluating my own relationship to it and my sense of home there following a few exchange programs on which I embarked during high school. The sense of wholeness I felt by living in the place where I grew up my whole childhood and adolescence, the sense of connection it gave me to my past while still cultivating a rich present in the same place, is a giant hole that I have not been able to fill in the intervening time, no matter how hard I try or what I do.
In Ann Arbor, the simplest and most banal of things seem inherently more familiar. The particular cerulean tint of the sky during late spring afternoons when the days grow long. The union of the specific bird species of the surrounding area fusing into a unique, locally crafted melody. The reflections of pale, fluffy clouds over the swiftly moving waters of the Huron River. The color of the freshly grown May leaves and the sweet scent of their blossoms. Even though there’s nothing specific or drastic which truly sets apart the terrain on which the lines between Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and other adjacent states and neatly defines them into the pockets of division we see on a map, somehow there’s an instant, palpable change that I not only feel, but also see, any time I cross over those state lines while returning to Michigan. To someone who grew up there, it just is, and is plain to see.

Seeing and being are not simple or static actions for me in Ann Arbor. When one returns to a place one lived in for so much of one’s life and formed such a massive part of one’s sense of self, it is not possible to simple see and be. Every action, every movement, every sight, is beset by remembering. The act of remembering is a state of constant navigation through spaces familiar from years of proximity, that have grown alien from just a few of prolonged absence. The familiarity comforts - one is reminded of all that has transpired in the spaces and the happy feelings of the memories and interactions they conjure. But they also estrange and alienate - the unfamiliarity, and the comparatively short period of time in which they have mushroomed into existence serve to sadden, and deepen the gap between the place, and the familiarity of the life left behind. They feed off of each other and work their way back and forth into otherwise ordinary actions and transitions, deepening the feelings of separation from the formerly unchallenged and unobstructed sense of home, and the frustration at the very nature of this disconnect. They accentuate rootlessness.

No matter how badly you may wish to leave in your youth, no matter how limiting, droll, or stifling it may seem at the time for any number of reasons, moving away from the place that you grew up effectively your entire childhood and adolescence is not easy. The very nature of this action necessitates a farewell to a cherished part of life that is more or less permanent, a severance from how unchallenged and permanent one’s sense of home and security used to be, that can never be wholly restored.

I know this is at least the case for me when I visit Ann Arbor. At this point, with my family having moved away over three years ago, I am fully aware of this severance every time I come to visit. I have already been since the first time I returned after we left, as the stark difference made itself clear almost right away. Being a guest at friends’ houses, welcome and relaxed, but ostensibly a visitor to my own hometown, was deeply disorienting, as having to shift my sense of center and direction to their homes instead of my own changed the whole feeling of being back in the first place. Every visit brings different experiences with it - I see many of the same people again, who I’ve known practically all my life, and reconnect or disconnect with them on various different levels. Sometimes I feel truly in my element and being back restores me in a way few other things can; for split seconds I’ll forget that I ever left, and I feel like I have my old life back. Others I feel lonely and utterly disconnected from any sense of my old life, deeply nostalgic for the sense of home and belonging that once fully surrounded me there, and is now gone. Each time I go back, I never know which it will be.

Every time I return, I do my very best to lose myself in Ann Arbor, to search far back in my mind and memories and reconstruct them into a tangible contemporary imitation that I can access and feel like I’m back again. I try to lose myself in downtown, and remember dinners there with my family at our favorite Indian and Middle Eastern restaurants, and wandering around the Summer Fest, once called (and still colloquially known as) “Top of the Park” with my high school friends on cool summer nights. I try to lose myself in the variable seasonal beauty of all my favorite parks - the County Farm, Gallup, Kensington State Park a while further outside of town - and their introspective natural retreats. I try to lose myself in the winding and often confusing streets of Ann Arbor Hills, the neighborhood I grew up in, which have earned it the nickname of “Spaghettiland,” and try to imagine for a moment that I’m back again in the life I once lived, that once again I’m just going for a walk around the block in between lessons or homework assignments or just to do something and get some fresh air out of the house.

Being back is like reassembling the familiar pieces of a beautiful puzzle that have been taken far apart from one another and tainted with some harsh substance. The image is still fundamentally the same, but it’s damaged and pixelated, beautiful in its own right, although it’s different, but irreparably and unmistakably not the same.

And although it may hurt when the washed out, stained elements of the new image override its original beauty, the image is too important and beautiful not to reassemble. I will continue returning to reassemble it for the rest of my life. Sometimes with greater success than others. But always with an earnest and optimistic commitment to remembering and paying tribute to all the places, people, things, and experiences in Ann Arbor that shaped me into who I’ve been, who I am, and who I’ll be.

"Glee"'s Kurt Hummel and the Power of Representation

Picture this: the year is 2009.

Young Nico is 12, soon to turn 13, years old, in the midst of his sixth grade year, still relatively enjoying the novelty of being in a new, bigger middle school environment alongside new faces from other elementary schools in the Ann Arbor district, still not stressed and overwhelmed by the anxiety, sleep deprivation, and social toxicity that will mushroom the following year.

Barack Obama has just become the forty-forth president of the United States. Iceland has just experienced its intense and dramatic economic collapse in the midst of the Great Recession, and newly elected Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir, the world's first openly lesbian head of state, as prime minister. Michael Jackson's passing has fans the world over in mourning. Velvet tracksuits, multicolored tights, and leggings as pants are all the rage in fashion. Owl City's "Fireflies," the Black Eyed Peas' "I Gotta Feeling," Miley Cyrus' "Party in the U.S.A.," Jason Mraz's "I'm Yours," and Beyonce's "Single Ladies" hover at the top of the hot 100 charts and reverberate on radios anywhere.

And the first season of the hit TV show Glee has just started airing.

For the uninitiated, Glee is a musical comedy-drama series which aired on the Fox network for six seasons from 2009 to 2015, focusing on the adventures, triumphs, struggles, and close bond of the members of the show choir New Directions at the fictional William McKinley High School in Lima, Ohio. It follows the evolution of the group and its original members from a shaky beginning as a newly formed, rag-tag little bunch of misfits, which the school's cheer coach Sue Sylvester constantly tries to have disbanded, to a strongly competitive, talented, and high-energy powerhouse of excellent covers. The show features and covers numerous social issues in American society through the experiences of the characters and their relationships to one another, in ways which sometimes reflect the clumsier nature of social issues and how they were understood ten years ago - but always with a lot of heart, affection, good intention, and genuine desire for greater understanding and harmony among all people.

Many such examples are to be found with Kurt Hummel - talented member of the New Directions' original founding members, a consummate fashionista, and for much of the show, McKinley High's only openly gay student.

From coming out for the first time to good friend and fellow New Directioner Mercedes Jones, opening up about his sexuality to his quite traditionally masculine father Burt (to great acceptance - Burt later goes on to go out of his way to educate himself on gay issues and sexuality so that his son can come to him with questions like any straight boy could), and never being afraid to sing music, wear clothes, and experiment with forms of expression deemed traditionally feminine, to overcoming vicious bullying issues, and eventually finding a loving relationship with his first boyfriend Blaine Anderson, the other half of the iconic duo dubbed "Klaine" by many fans and shippers, Kurt's role in the show and gay representation in the media is not to be understated.

In the summer of 2018, a Klaine video popped up in my YouTube "recommended" list after I had just returned from my junior year of college studying abroad in Moscow, Russia and Turku, Finland. My curiosity piqued, I then spent the month I had at home before leaving for a summer program in Reykjavik, Iceland watching the first three seasons of Glee. The latter two for the first time. But I was surprised to find that the first season felt almost wholly familiar, like I was rewatching it, even though I didn't feel like I had watched it that closely when it was coming out.

Flashing back to 2009: At the time I had just received my first little netbook laptop as a Christmas present. But in spite of the greater mobility it offered to sit on my oversized beanbag in the quiet comfort of my own room, I still often preferred to spend my long sessions of perusing my new Facebook page on the computer in our living room, and often wound up at least peripherally watching whatever my sister was watching on TV as a result. Case in point with Glee. 

At the time, she was closely following Season 1. And even though I seldom actually sat down on the couch across from her to watch it together, it looked and sounded nice enough to capture my attention and get me to rotate the swivel chair at my parents' desk where the computer stood to pay attention for a while. Perhaps no more so than when Kurt was on screen.

At the time, I had barely even begun to realize that I was gay. I knew very little about what it meant to be gay, or the history and community behind the label, and was not self-aware enough to realize that the feelings I was struggling with were closely tied to feeling uncomfortable in my own body, not understanding the feelings that I couldn't control that so much of society was telling me were wrong, and feeling out of place and unrepresented in such a straight world. But among all the other tensions of feeling lonely, weird, and not enough in the socially cutthroat environment of Tappan Middle School, my baby gay angst and anxiety were some of the top causes of the stress I was undergoing. Even without an exact handle on that being a big source of my confusion and issues, even thinking that my stress and loneliness were exclusively products of the social environment and how I fit into it, I couldn't help but feel like something was deeply, fundamentally different about me compared to many others around me, far beyond the unique interests and habits that had defined me growing up, which often differed from those of the other kids, especially the other boys, around me.

"Gay" at that time was not a word with a pleasant connotation, usually either used as a general synonym of "bad" or "sucky" ("that's so gay") which has thankfully greatly decreased over the years, or to refer to what it actually describes - homosexuality - but in a greatly overstereotyped and disdainful way. Even though I wasn't yet aware of my own sexual orientation, every time I heard the word, or so many other hurtful and nasty ones associated with it, echo down my middle school hallways, my chest would clench and I would go numb with fear.

When I turned in that swivel chair from the ever-important business of making copious amounts of Facebook statuses with positively atrocious spelling and syntactical construction of all sorts (because for some reason I had it in my head at the time that proper spelling and grammar online was not cool), it was for a reason.

I was captivated and mesmerized by Kurt. I loved his energy. I loved his extravagant and innovative style, his fearless desire to push aesthetic boundaries, his refusal to let himself or anything he loved be defined by meaningless and trite expectations of gender norms. I loved his powerful singing voice and how it seemed to soar effortlessly into alto high notes. I loved his covers and how he brought who he was and his heart and soul into all of what he sang (perhaps nowhere else more so than his cover of "Defying Gravity," which I listened to for years, mesmerized by his beautiful voice and empowered of his rendition of a traditionally feminine song, especially before important turning points and new chapters of my life, like when I went to Italy in middle school for six months, before high school, and as I was getting ready for my high school exchange year in Egypt that I'd dreamed of for years, imagining myself soaring high above the Pyramids of Giza as he hit his high notes - I still listen to it lovingly as a reminder of my periods of greatest drive and determination in life, as well as to find new inspiration). I loved his high-pitched, softer-spoken speaking voice, how relaxing and soothing it was to listen to. I loved how even though sometimes he felt alone, afraid, mistreated, or ignored, he never let himself be walked over, and always called people out on their bullshit and didn't let them stifle him. I loved how bright, optimistic, effervescent, gentle, loving and kind he was. Any time I saw him on screen, I would light up and be mesmerized without quite knowing why. As I was only just beginning to understand at the time, I saw myself in him, I related to him, and I felt connected to him.

I think it's important to acknowledge the fact that there certainly were moments on Glee when various issues were handled clumsily or even in very insensitive ways, or where there were humorous references to things that shouldn't ever be joked about. I will be clear in saying that I don't overlook or play those down. It's definitely important to keep them in mind (in a way, it's also kind of helpful and reassuring to see how far we've come in terms of perceiving those things in just a few years). But conversely, I don't think it makes sense to write off the show completely as being problematic and overlook all the things it got right for those missteps. There are also numerous instances of very important issues, relationships, conversations, and representation that the show absolutely nailed, and as many of those moments and relationships are deeply important to many people, they deserve to be wholeheartedly celebrated.

Was Kurt, for instance, a bit stereotypical? Oh yeah, no doubt about it. But even rewatching the show today, I often find myself forgetting it. Because he's so confident and fearless and self-assured of who he is that he doesn't let the stereotypes define him. He always brings his own unique perspectives, experiences, and approaches to everything that the does, and does everything that he loves with immeasurable passion. He is fiercely devoted to the people that he cares about. He is brave and determined in everything that he does. He is committed to growing, to fulfilling his dreams, to doing what he believes is best. But, in spite of all the pain and hardship of growing up as a feminine, openly gay man in a small Midwestern town, he also remains strongly connected to the place he comes from and conscious of his sentimental connection to it and how it's shaped him, as well as to making Lima and all the places that matter most to him there better. He's an unapologetic hopeless romantic, both in love and life goals. He knows who he is, and he shares that with his loved ones and the whole world in absolutely beautiful ways. He sang with drive and passion, bringing all of who he was and what he had lived into gorgeous covers of iconic songs.

The issue of representation for marginalized people remains a critically important one for this reason. Looking back on how I felt watching the first season of Glee as a twelve and later thirteen-year-old, I am conscious of how important it was to have a character like Kurt on-screen that I could look up to. Seeing him being who he was openly and fearlessly was deeply, deeply validating and empowering. Even not being fully conscious of who I was just yet, I looked at him and I felt calm. Seen. Heard. And like I had a future. Like I could hope for growth and love and community and pursuing my dreams just like anyone else around me.

And for that reason, I will always be deeply grateful to Glee and to Chris Colfer, the amazing actor and singer (and now best-selling writer of the Land of Stories series!) behind Kurt, for allowing me to come into my own as a young gay boy looking up to such a beautiful and inspiring character.

A piece about my identity

An original poem

Hey, everyone!

I honestly am at a loss for words on how to start this post.
I can barely believe how long it's been since I posted anything on here.
My senior year of college has been a rewarding, but tremendously challenging, experience, and between everything that's happened, all the things I've done, and the various day-to-day challenges I've been working through in terms of shaky mental health and planning for the future, there's a lot to catch up on.

I'm most likely going to hold off on properly catching up for a few weeks longer, until I finish classes, graduate, and make it home to rest for a few weeks. For now, I'm going to do something that I've been meaning to for a time, and share an original poem of mine on this blog.
I've been writing poetry for fun since I was a child (and getting progressively better over the years - at least I hope), and for a time I've wanted to start sharing more of them on this blog (stay tuned for more).

The one that I'll be sharing today is a poem which I've written recently, and is commemorative of a very special and emotionally powerful experience I had two years ago today. I submitted three poems to the campus lit magazine at Beloit, called Pocket Lint, a few weeks ago, including this one, and although they did select one for their spring issue, they didn't include this one, and as I'm very fond of and proud of it and would like for people to see it, I've decided to share it on here.

I hope you all like it. Be back soon!



The Art of Forgetting:

I want to forget the sound of your voice

and the sweet nothings you quietly whispered

into my naive young ears -

how earnest and well-intentioned it all seemed.

I want to forget the rush of the cool breeze of that fateful spring evening

as I walked under the towering golden clouds

on my way to meet you

with shaky hands and butterflies in my stomach

and how every breeze like it brings me back to those moments

of jittery excitement and spontaneity.

I want to forget the hypnotizing patchwork of jagged navy clouds

framing streaks of blue sky

and the lingering, periwinkle glow of twilight above us

as we walked back to my house

inching ever closer to one another.

I want to forget how gently you stroked the nimble tabby cat

who jumped into my lap

and petted her just so,

with your wrist slowly coming to rest on my leg

just to let me know it was there.

I want to forget how cozy and right it felt

to sit next to you on my bed,

and how my heart fluttered and my stomach tingled

when you asked if you could kiss me;

how happy it made me feel

simply that you wanted to.

I want to forget the words of our native languages that we taught each other

unraveling them gently

and trading them with gentle flickers of our tongues

soft to the touch.

I want to forget where you touched me -

that little fusion between thumb and hand

that you stroked so tenderly, so delicately.

I want to forget the light you brought into my room

and the warmth you brought into my bed,

how safe and careless I felt nestled between your arms

with your heartbeat against my back.

I want to forget the velvety touch of your parted lips around my own

and the soft strokes of your tongue through my giddy smile.

I want to forget how you looked at the painting of an elephant inside a snake

against a starry sky

while you held me

and asked if it was from The Little Prince -

it still hangs on the same side of my new room

and I can’t help but think of you

every time I look at it.

I want to forget

the feeling of promise

and hope that took hold in my heart

and the pain that came all too quickly

when the waves of the seas that soon stood between us

gleefully battered and smashed it to pieces.

I want to forget how I went to sit on the porch of my house under the bright sunshine

a whole half hour before you were supposed to come say goodbye,

how my heart tightened and skipped a beat with every person that walked past

even if they looked nothing like you,

and how deeply my heart sunk

when I realized you weren’t coming.

I want to forget

All the miserable hours I wasted alone

hoping trustfully

then crying pathetically

and finally shifting into holding a futile

but festering grudge.

I want to forget the pieces of my heart

That I scattered as I traveled across the world

That had traces of you written all over them.

I want to forget the silly optimism I felt

when I returned

that for once, finally, what I’d hoped for would be.

I want to forget how much it hurt

for you to make me

and everything I felt

utterly invisible.

I know you probably didn’t mean for it to hurt,

but you did hurt me

so badly

and part of me hates you for it

and part of me loves you yet

and I’m so full of anger

but also still miss you

and it confuses me so much.

I wish I could say I haven’t thought of you every single day

since that night

but I’d be lying.

In the end

no matter how much it still may hurt

I’m not sure I can ever manage

to forget something as beautiful

as the evening I met you.

Un nuovo articolo mio in italiano - A new article of mine in Italian

Hey guys!

So a few months back, my lovely friend Sofia extended her invitation from the first article I wrote on the University of Bologna Blog's website to any others I might like to write. I submitted this one and figured I would wait to share it with you all until it was ready, published on their website, and with a link to share, but for some reason or another, it seems that they never got around to it. So since I was proud of this writing, I figured I would just go ahead and share it on this blog anyway.

As with last time, I will provide the original text in Italian, and an English translation for anyone interested who cannot read Italian.

I hope you all enjoy.

“Tell me what democracy looks like!” “THIS is what democracy looks like!” “No Trump, no KKK, no racist USA!”

Proietto questi gridi da battaglia con tutta forza, unendola con le migliaia di altre voci a mio fianco - voci afroamericane, voci gay, voci arabe, latinoamericane, ebree, musulmane, alleate. Diventano un unico strido gigantesco, motivando questa marea di umanità contro l'inserzione di un presidente sanzionato da gruppi neonazisti. Sono in centro a Chicago, partecipando alla prima manifestazione della mia vita il giorno dell’inaugurazione del quarantacinquesimo presidente degli Stati Uniti d’America, Donald J. Trump. Marciamo insieme in mezzo alla città, le autostrade attorno, e il lungolago, uniti dalla nostra nostalgia di un governo stabile e giusto, mentre i nostri urli risuonano in questa citta’ leggermente avvolta da una nebbia eterea.

“No hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here!” “Black lives matter!” “No ban, no wall!” "Donald Trump, GO AWAY! Racist, sexist, anti-gay!"

Questa volta di nuovo sto in piedi insieme a un gruppo dei miei compagni universitari, in un parco di Janesville, Wisconsin, una mezz'oretta da dove studio. Siamo in mezzo a una vasta folle di gente che doveva essere sotto i cento, ma invece sono giunti più di quattromille. Ascoltiamo le voci appassionate di una pastoressa di una chiesa locale, moglie di un immigrato indù; quella di una leader della comunità di una chiesa messicana locale dove si venera in spagnolo; quella di un professore iraniano di fisica alla University of Wisconsin Whitewater a meno di due ore di distanza, che ora bloccato si lamenta con un'elegante e leggera cadenza shirazi della la propria incapacità di tornare al suo paese di origine a trovare i suoi cari.

Altra marcia, altri gridi di battaglia, questa volta tra gelidi venti e neve vorticosa. Mi scaldo periodicamente le mani per trovare un equilibrio tra orgogliosamente oscillare il mio cartello con su scritto “niente paura, niente odio, i profughi sono benvenuti qui” in varie lingue e non congelarle in questo freddo di meno sei gradi.

Quest’ultima è una manifestazione contro l’Ordine Esecutiva 13769, che proibisce ai profughi di guerra e qualsiasi cittadino iraniano, iracheno, sudanese, libico, siriano, somali, o yemenita di entrare “nel nostro paese.” In risposta ai cittadini di questi paesi che le autorità hanno cominciato a detenere quasi subito, tra cui bambini e anziani, una marea di manifestazioni così sono comparse in tutto il paese, in particolare negli aeroporti responsabili.

Assisto a questa manifestazione con in mente in particolare mia madre, un’immigrata italiana lei stessa dalla Provincia di Mantova, provando abbondante orgoglio come figlio suo e di due paesi a difendere i diritti e l’inclusione di gente che è tanto più uguale a noi di quello che ci vorrebbero far credere.

Questa purtroppo di qualche modo è diventata la nostra realtà degli Stati Uniti nel 2017. Svegliarsi alla mattina tutti i giorni significa fare un controllo dei danni, e i crimini di odio contro vari gruppi emarginati sono spaventosamente frequenti.

Anche su il mio campus, che si autopropaganda come un bastione di liberalismo nel Wisconsin rurale, due studenti, una ebrea e l’altro musulmano, si ritrovano con orripilanti e odiose minacce scritte su o sotto le porte delle loro camere. Nei giorni e le settimane seguenti, c'è  una spinta determinata verso l'unità e la solidarietà con i nostri compagni ebrei e musulmani, con spazi ed eventi speciali che vengono dedicati alle loro particolari lotte. Ma il fatto che siano necessari questi provvedimenti parla da solo.

Ho detto anche in passato che qualunque cittadino americano che non è un uomo cristiano eterosessuale di origini europee e non disabile è in vero ed imminente pericolo, e purtroppo questa amministrazione presidenziale continua a dimostrare la verità di questa idea. E va peggiorando.

Per combattere questa insidiosa ingiustizia, per proteggere le vite di chiunque soffre o sia in pericolo, dobbiamo tenere i movimenti di umanità così in vita. I cittadini che hanno qualsiasi tipo di privilegio tra queste diverse e multiforme identità devono osare a difendere chi ne abbia bisogno, o essere considerati complici nell'inserzione di un regime autocratico. Solo in unione ci potrà essere speranza.

“Tell me what democracy looks like!” “THIS is what democracy looks like!” “No Trump, no KKK, no racist USA!”

I project these battle cries with all my strength, uniting mine with the thousands of other voices around me - black voices, gay voices, Arab, Latinx, Jewish, Muslim voices; united. They become one giant cry, spurring this tide of humanity on against the insertion of a president endorsed by neo-Nazis. I'm in downtown Chicago, participating in the first protest of my life the day of the inauguration of the forty-fifth president of the United States of America, Donald J. Trump. We march together in the middle of the city streets, the highways along its edges, and the lakeside, united in a nostalgia for the stable and just government we'd known that very morning, as our shouts echo through this city wrapped in a light, ethereal fog.

“No hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here!” “Black lives matter!” “No ban, no wall!” "Donald Trump, GO AWAY! Racist, sexist, anti-gay!"

I again stand with a group of my college classmates, this time in the middle of a park in Janesville, Wisconsin, about a half hour from where we study. We are among a vast crowd of people that was predicted to be less than a hundred, and instead over four thousand of us have gathered. We listen to the impassioned speeches of the pastor of a local Christian church, the wife of a Hindu immigrant; another community leader from a Spanish-speaking church in the area; an Iranian business professor from the University of Wisconsin Whitewater, about two hours away, who in an elegant and gentle Shirazi lilt laments his inability to visit his loved ones back home.

Another march, more battle cries, this time with frigid winds and swirling snowflakes to contend with. I periodically warm my hands to strike a balance between proudly brandishing my multilingual "no hate, no fear, immigrants are welcome here" sign, and avoiding losing feeling in my fingers in this 21-degree cold.

This latter one is a protest against Executive Order 13769, which forbids entry to all refugees and any Iranian, Iraqi, Sudanese, Libyan, Syrian, Somali, or Yemeni citizen into "our country." In response to the citizens of this country with origins in the aforementioned seven that the authorities began to detain almost immediately, among which children and senior citizens, a tidal wave of such protests has sprung up around the United States, particularly in the airports responsible.

I attend this protest with my mother in mind, an Italian immigrant from the Province of Mantova, who came to this country and built a life and identity for herself beautifully fusing the warmth and love from where she grew up, and the dynamic innovation and opportunities she found here. I feel abundant pride in my heart as her son and the son of two countries to defend the rights and inclusion of people that are far more like us than many would have us think.

Unfortunately, this has somehow become our reality in the United States of 2017. Waking up every day is an exercise in damage control, with hate crimes against all kinds of minority groups skyrocketing.

Even on my college campus, which defines itself as a bastion of liberalism and diversity in rural southern Wisconsin, two students, one Jewish and one Muslim, have found themselves the victims of hate crimes, with horrifying and hateful threats written on or below the doors to their rooms. In the days and weeks following, there is a determined push towards togetherness and solidarity with our Jewish and Muslim classmates, with spaces and special events dedicated to their particular struggles. But the fact that these are necessary speaks for itself.

I've said in the past that every American citizen who is not a straight, cisgender, able-bodied white man is in real and imminent danger, and sadly since it came to power the current presidential administration has only enforced this idea. And it keeps worsening.

To combat such insidious injustice, to protect the lives of all who are suffering or find themselves in danger, we must keep such movements promoting basic humanity alive. Citizens with any kind of privilege among these diverse and multifaceted identities must dare to defend who needs to be defended, or be held complicit in the rise to power of a dangerous authoritarian regime. Only in union will there be hope.

A letter to my representatives in the United States legislature

(I'll let this letter speak for itself. Kindly join me in writing to/calling your local representatives if you are an American citizen, signing this petition, and doing all you can to stand up against bigotry and populism wherever you may live in the world).

I think I'll let this letter speak for itself. 

Dear Representative/Senator,

I am an alumnus of the National Security Initiative for Youth (NSLI-Y)’s 2014 program in Bursa, Turkey. This State Department-sponsored scholarship program sends high schoolers abroad to learn languages considered critical to the interests of the United States government, those being Arabic, Mandarin Chinese, Hindi, Korean, Tajiki Persian, Russian, and Turkish. This program is currently under threat from the budget cuts targeting funding to ECA State Department programs, save for the Fulbright Fellowship. 

I can go on at infinite length on the benefits of exchange. As the son of an Italian immigrant who first came to the United States as an American Field Service (AFS) exchange student in 1978, and having participated in multiple exchanges myself, in Alexandria, Egypt, and Bursa, Turkey, these experiences and the members of the communities built around them are a part of who I am. They helped me to better understand and relate to other cultures, shaped my worldview beyond recognition, and allowed me to connect to people in every country I’ve visited since with new mediums and languages. 

Every single alumnus and alumna I know have said the same. 

Particularly on my NSLI-Y program, I forged a passion for a language that I intend to make an integral part of my personal life and future career, an opportunity I would almost certainly never have had prior to college if it had not been for the State Department’s generous support of these programs.

The Turkish programs which I participated in have been particularly affected by the violence and senseless populism which have plagued various parts of the world, having been canceled since 2016 in the wake of Turkey’s numerous terrorist attacks and attempted coup. But such attacks and political turmoil are not endemic to any region in the world, as can be clearly seen in our country currently. 

Though travel and exchange at any point in life and education will only serve to foster understanding and eliminate bigotry, high school exchange represents a particularly precious opportunity, allowing students to fully become part of families in their host countries and learn their target languages from within the culture itself, more fluently than would ever be possible in most other contexts.

Aside from my personal feelings regarding this wonderful program, it also cannot be ignored that these are an irrefutable positive force for United States foreign relations. Many alumni I know have expressed interest in one day working for the United States government and State Department as a direct result of this program. Many of them intend to work in countries or regions where their target languages are widely used or understood, most of which are of great importance as strategic allies to the United States, and are instrumental to the maintenance of a stable and productive US foreign policy. 

Quite frankly, given the current state of affairs in the world, treating any program like NSLI-Y as though it is not necessary, some sort of “extra cost,” is utter folly. The only way that we can hope to foster true peace and understanding is to uphold and push the goals enshrined in programs like this. I urge you thus to vote against this measure and to uphold these values yourself going further. I know for a fact that for myself and many other members of the NSLI-Y, AFS, Critical Language Scholarship (CLS), Youth Exchange and Study (YES) Abroad, Congress-Bundestag Youth Exchange (CBYX), and countless other exchange alumni communities, this will become a crucial element which will heavily influence our reelection of future officials.

Thank you for your concern,
Nicholas Borbely
Beloit Resident

Il mio primo articolo (in italiano e in generale) - My first article (in Italian and in general)

Hello everyone!

I'm writing to you today from beautiful northern Italy, where I am spending my winter break visiting my relatives for the holidays.
I greatly apologize for my silence over the course of this semester, but it was a tough one. New posts will soon arrive, covering a variety of topics, from how my semester went to my favorite regional dialects and accents in the languages I know.
Today, however, I wanted to share something very special with you all. A few months ago, my Italian friend Sofia, who I met in Iceland, asked me if I wanted to write an article on this disaster of a recent American election on her university's blog. To which I heartily agreed.
I decided it would be great to share it with whatever readership I have here on my personal blog as well.

I am including the link of the article on the University of Bologna's website, the original text in Italian, and a translation for anyone interested in what I have to say about this who does not read Italian. I hope you guys may like it. I will let the article speak for my feelings regarding the election.

Senza riguardo ai risultati, queste recenti elezioni avrebbero rappresentato un momento storico per gli Stati Uniti. Purtroppo in fine non saranno storiche nel modo in cui speravano tante persone. Mentre molti aspettavano fiduciosamente l’elezione della prima presidente donna nella storia del nostro paese, invece ci troviamo adesso con un uomo che ha vinto le elezioni solo per via dell’inutile e antiquato vestigio del collegio elettorale, che per l’interezza della sua campagna presidenziale ha approvvigionato e assecondato i segmenti della popolazione più sessisti, razzisti, omofobi, xenofobi, antisemiti, e islamofobi nel paese. Già con solo una settimana di seguito dall’annuncio della sua vincita, i crimini di odio contro le persone di colore, LGBT, immigrati, ebrei, e musulmani sono saliti alle stelle. Inoltre, la sua sconcertante credenza che il cambiamento climatico sia una farsa e la sua conseguente dedizione a eliminare la partecipazione degli Stati Uniti a tratti internazionali di sostenibilità ecologica potrebbero avere conseguenze devastanti per il clima non solo del nostro paese, ma globale.

C’è tanta discussione in questi giorni dei risultati delle elezioni, e tante persone hanno reagito in modo estremo e emozionale da entrambi i lati dello spettro politico. Però mentre tanti sostenitori di Donald Trump accusano i loro avversari di “lamentarsi” che la loro candidata nonabbia vinto, la realtà non potrebbe essere più tristemente diversa.

La realtà è che molte tra le popolazioni del paese adesso hanno paura per le proprie vite. E giustamente. Nei giorni successivi all’annuncio dei risultati, il presidente eletto parla in un modo decisamente più posato e sedato rispetto alla retorica aggressiva e divorziata dalla realtà che ha definito la sua campagna politica, con il risultato che alcune persone privilegiate si trovano più disposte a dargli una possibilità. D’altra parte tuttavia, che compia le sue losche promesse o meno, il paese ha perso, e ogni suo cittadino che non è un uomo cristiano eterosessuale di origine europee e non disabile è in pericolo. In Donald Trump, la così-chiamata “destra alternativa,” che in realtà sono letterali neonazisti, tra cui la infama Klu Klux Klan, ha trovato una figura politica dietro la quale può ristabilirsi, e la sua vincita le ha provveduto nuovo potere e comodità  di esprimere le proprie credenze odiose con l’illusione di maggior accettazione. Non si sentono più costretti a nascondere il disprezzo nei confronti di chiunque sia diverso, e così anche con più di un mese rimasto fino alla sua inaugurazione, le conseguenze delle implicazioni catastrofiche di questa elezione si stanno già manifestando. 

Con tutte queste insidiose ripercussioni molti si sentono comprensibilmente vulnerabili e devastati. Ma tra tutti gli scherzi di trasferimenti in Canada o di matrimoni con amici europei per ottenere altre cittadinanze, è necessario analizzare il proprio privilegio e pensare criticamente a ciò che possiamo fare tutti per lottare per l’America vera. Quella della tribù sioux che combatte coraggiosamente a Standing Rock nel North Dakota per proteggere la propria terra. Quella dell’immigrazione che ha costruito uno dei popoli più variegati al mondo. Quella che ha legalizzato i matrimoni omosessuali al livello federale meno di due anni fa. Quella dell’infinita forza e sopravvivenza da parte delle minoranze razziali manifestate nel movimento “Black Lives Matter.” Questa America esiste ancora, nei milioni americani che sono in lutto per la rispettabilità della nostra politica nazionale. I più di 64 milioni che hanno votato per Hillary Clinton saranno sempre delusi che la natura storica di questa elezione non sarà definita dalla scelta della prima presidente donna degli Stati Uniti d’America. Ma se vogliamo sostenere i valori ed argomenti che avrebbe abbracciato una presidenza di Clinton, dobbiamo rimanere informati, determinati, e disposti a rimanere per lottare per i diritti dei nostri fratelli e sorelle emarginate. E’ la loro sicurezza che conta per la sopravvivenza della vera America.

Regardless of its results, this recent election would have represented a historic moment for the United States. Unfortunately, in the end they were not historic in the way that many people were hoping. While many of us were hopefully awaiting the election of the first woman president in the country's history, we instead find ourselves with a man who has won the election only by merit of the useless and outdated vestige of the Electoral College, who for the entirety of his campaign has catered to and indulged the most sexist, racist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic, and anti-Semitic sectors of the population. Already only two months after his election, hate crimes against people of color, the queer community, Jews, Muslims, and many others have skyrocketed. Furthermore, his disconcerting belief that climate change is a hoax and his consequential dedication to cancelling American participation in international environmental sustainability treaties could have devastating consequences for the climate not only of the United States, but of the whole world.

There is much discussion of the election's results these days, and many have reacted in extreme and emotional manners on both sides. But while supporters of Donald Trump accuse their adversaries of "whining" that their desired candidate did not win, the reality could not be more different.

The reality is that many people now fear for their lives. As they should. In the days following the election, the president elect speaks in a decidedly more composed and sedated manner compared to the aggressive rhetoric divorced from reality that defined his presidential campaign. Consequentially, more privileged individuals have felt more inclined to "give him a chance." However, on the other hand, whether he fulfills his sinister promises or not, the country has lost. Every one of its citizens that is not a white, cisgender, heterosexual, able-bodied Christian man is now in very real danger. In Donald Trump, the so-called "alt-right," more accurately described as literal neo-Nazis, among which the infamous Klu Klux Klan, has found a political figure it can rally behind and restabilize itself, and his victory has provided them new power and commodity to express their beliefs under the illusion of their greater acceptance. They no longer feel forced to hide their contempt and hatred towards anyone who is different, and so, even with weeks left until the inauguration, the catastrophic implications of this election have already begun to manifest themselves.

With all these insidious repercussions, many feel understandably devastated and vulnerable. But among all the jokes about moving to Canada or marrying European friends with the goal of obtaining new citizenships, it is necessary to analyze one's privilege and think critically about what one can do to fight for the real America. That of the Sioux tribe combating courageously at Standing Rock Reservation in North Dakota to preserve their beloved land. That of the immigration that has produced one of the world's most diverse populations. That of the infinite strength and survival of the country's racial minorities expressed in the Black Lives Matter movement. This America still exists, in the millions of Americans fighting for the respectability of our nation's politics. The over 64 million people who voted for Hillary Clinton will always be disappointed that the historical nature of this election will not be defined by the election of the first woman president of the United States of America. But if we wish to sustain the values and issues that a Clinton presidency would have embraced, we must remain informed, determined, and ready to stay and fight for the rights of our marginalized siblings. Their safety is what counts for the survival of the real America.


Thank you all for reading.
Much love, good vibes, stay safe, and never give up on fighting for what you know is right.
-Nico