Without A Script

A Progress Report

I like to know a story’s ending before I write its beginning. It gives me clarity to always know where I’m standing, and certainty to know which sentence to write next. It gives me distance to evaluate which sentence is necessary and which one is redundant, and it gives me power to write the story the way I want. I like these perfect stories with a definite beginning and end and with a harmonious script. Yet, life is not a story like this.

Time and again, I find myself trying to break down my life into stories: I select past experiences that I want to remember, and I make plans for the future. I try to give my life clarity and purpose – and it revolts against it. All I can write therefore is a progress report.

If there Would Be a Main Plot

Last September, I moved to Amsterdam to start my studies of “Politics, Psychology, Law, and Economics” (PPLE). I am really satisfied with my program even though it sometimes challenges me (and I sometimes challenge it, too). PPLE poses questions that are relevant to me, about the causes and implications of societal phenomena, and approaches them in a way that to me seems fit.

One of the great advantages of the course is its multidisciplinary. Not only do I learn about a wide range of topics from political philosophy to psychological principles, but I also acquire different skills, from rhetoric to statistics. This way I get to know the different systems of thought and methods of multiple disciplines and learn to compare and critically assess them.

However, the wideness of the program also has drawbacks: The courses I took until now each offered an introduction to the respective discipline but failed to delve deeper into the topic. I hope that in upcoming semesters and after I choose my major, I will be able to deepen my knowledge in one field. Right now, I am planning to specialize in Politics.

If there Would Be a Sub Plot

During my time in Amsterdam, I have learned that arriving is a process that takes time, openness, and presence. Initially, I often felt overwhelmed, both by my study program and by “Room for Discussion”, a student-run interview platform hosting interviews with personalities from politics, economics, and academia multiple times a month. For quite some time, I felt like a foreign body amidst the unknown people and routines surrounding me.

It took time until the people around me and I got to know each other and until I found my place. My efforts to invite interviewees and to become a co-interviewer were (and are) often unsuccessful. Yet, together with my co-interviewers, whom I now also call friends, I had the chance to moderate two panel discussions and conduct my first interview. Arriving, it turns out, is a process that never ends. But the last months have shown me just how important it is.

If there Would Be a Turning Point

A lot has changed since the war between Israel and Hamas began. I suffered, although I know that my suffering is nothing compared to what people in Israel and Gaza are experiencing. On the one hand, the war affects me directly because of my relationships with people living there. My boyfriend’s family has been evacuated for six months, living in a hotel room that is approximately the size of my student dorm. The Palestinian family I know has for the past six months been living with the background noise of shelling of rockets. It is crucial and in a weird way consoling for me to talk to those people, and to share our mutual feelings of lacking security, agency, and prospects. I hope that for them, talking to me is somewhat comforting too.

Secondly, the war affects me indirectly through the stir it creates in Europe. At my university, the topic is surrounded by a screaming silence. While protest marches, toilet doors, and Social Media posts scream at me, hardly anyone earnestly talks about the war and its implications. Simplifications and prejudice prevent any discussion. I am grateful for my family in Germany and my friends in Amsterdam who are, somewhere amidst the stir of polarization and hatred, like quiet spaces of discussion, respect, and nuance for me.

Finally, the war affects me because of the discrepancy of experiences and news coverage between the Middle East and Europe. Israelis and Palestinians as well as Europeans are experiencing such different realities that even if they want to communicate, talk at cross purposes. It took many (and some heated) debates with my boyfriend until I realized that this war has meanings for him that I did not or cannot understand. Many people in Israel are living in a reality in which the attacks of the 7th of October continue to have an effect, in which family members are fighting in the army or are still held hostage by Hamas. Debates about Israel’s long-term strategy, Palestinian autonomy, and a two-state solution are important and necessary but fade in light of this reality. Similar things are true for Palestinian people.

It will take time until the trauma both Palestinians and Israelis experience subsides, and until, progress and, maybe one day, reconciliation are possible. Until then, I believe, people in Europe should refrain from chanting slogans they often don’t understand. Instead, we should have the courage and humbleness to be humble enough to listen to one another and to admit that we don’t know everything.

If there would be an End

In this story, as in my life, I neither know the next step nor do I know the end. Many developments are neither clear nor controllable, and many make no sense. I live in a story without a script. To accept that my power over my life is limited is often hard.

But sometimes, it is easy too. As I am writing these words I am sitting at the quay, in front of me stretches the IJ. I observe how people slow down and how the sun colors the sky red, tearing this moment out of time. Why do we always pursue a perfect story? Is it not moments like these that are, precisely because of their unpredictability and insignificance, immeasurably valuable?

(P.S.: I am searching for a room in Amsterdam from July/August onwards. If you are looking for a roommate or a future tenant or in case you have possibly helpful contacts, please reach out via email at ehknetsch@gmail.com or on Instagram @elisabethknetsch)