Ufuk K. talks about his own change of perspective. For him, the Wende undermined his personal achievements.
“I had the feeling that the 16 years I spent in Germany reaching a certain status as a Turkish man were just slipping away. The Wall is gone, the new Germany is so hyped, and everything I did for the last 16 years doesn’t matter. I have to start again.”
Ufuk K. says that the events of 1989 and 1990 came as a shock. The reunification reversed personal efforts to become a part of German society, and, at least for a time, made them secondary.
Nevim ?il, “The Other and the Foreign Outsider: Second and Third Generation Turks in Reunited Germany,” in Insider-Outsider.
