I read how Aminat had grown up in a Soviet ghetto without a father, just her mother’s ever-changing men. How she had starved and had been beaten for being such a disobedient child. How finally she had been sold to a German pedophile by her grandmother in exchange for him marrying her mother, and how she landed in Germany as a result. I read and read, but there was nothing about me. Typical.

Communism, my dear,” I said when I managed to get hold of a bunch of bananas for hers and let them ripen on the windowsill, given her just one each day so they’d last for a while.

I had tried to teach her that nobody should be able to see when you were scared. That nobody should be able to tell when you were uncertain. That you shouldn’t show it when you loved someone. And that you smiled with particular affection at someone you hated.

If at my age i still spent time wondering about people I’d never manage to get around to so much as brushing my teeth.

Sometimes I do readings and people can’t stop laughing, but I’m reading about pretty tragic things. I think Soviet humor is a desperate humor, rather typical of very different nations, of Jewish people, Ukrainians, and of course, Russians. It’s despair – just keep laughing, until you are dead.

Watch out for people who feel weak. They may want to feel strong one day and you might not survive that moment.

Wie viel einfacher habe ich es mein ganzes Leben lang gehabt. Nie schön gewesen zu sein bedeutet, keine Angst gehabt zu haben, die Schönheit zu verlieren.

Bananen sind Spiegelei für die Sinne, sie sind eigentlich zu süß, lassen sich aber gut kauen.

Politik ist natürlich wichtig, aber es bleibt trotzdem immer an einem selbst hängen, die Kartoffeln zu düngen, wenn man irgendwann Püree essen will.

Meine Arbeit hat mich gelehrt, dass Menschen immer und ausschließlich das tun, was sie wollen. Sie fragen nach Ratschlägen, aber eigentlich brauchen sie fremde Meinungen nicht. Aus jedem Satz filtern sie nur das heraus, was ihnen gefällt. Den Rest ignorieren sie. Ich habe gelernt, keine Ratschläge zu erteilen, wenn man mich nicht ausdrücklich darum bittet. Außerdem habe ich gelernt, keine Fragen zu stellen.