Who You Are and Where You Live

By Kelly Raftery

My post today is a follow up to Saturday's post in which I provide an overview of the independent countries of the former Soviet Union, to help readers make sense of the recent media reports regarding the bombings at the Boston Marathon. Specifically, the two suspects in that crime are ethnic Chechens who were partly raised in Kyrgyzstan, with one of them being born there. The media's reporting on their cultural heritage has been a mixed bag, and in many cases, erroneous.

One of the comments I received in response to that post was from one of my fellow bloggers:

“... even after reading your post, I’m still puzzled as far as why these kids would/did not identify more with Kyrgyz culture, even despite the complicated geo-political history in that region. They were born and raised there (at least one of them), presumably went to school there, learned the language, mingled with the locals, etc. And it wasn’t the brutality of the Kyrgyz that forced Chechens to relocate there but that of the Soviets, right? Seems like there are plenty of governments that wronged various countries (the British in India, for example) but now there is cross-immigration between the people of both cultures and the past is the past, the subsequent generations are less bothered by what came before. Why is it so different in Kyrgyzstan, do you think?”

I will preface this by saying I am not an expert nor would I claim to be about the Caucasus. That area is complex and full of nuances of which I am completely ignorant. I have traveled in the area, but never been anything more than a tourist. 

A Dagestani Man from Historic Photos

So instead I will respond to you about ethnicity and identity in the Soviet Union and post-Soviet Union, because I think that is really the essence of your questions above. You ask, “Why is it so different in Kyrgyzstan?”  It is not a situation limited to Kyrgyzstan; these dynamics play out throughout the former Soviet Union and are not exclusive to any one country or area.

One’s ethnic identity in the Soviet Union was (and is) a very concrete, non-malleable thing. Here in America, at some point, the immigrant children or grandchildren identify more closely with being “American” than to their heritage of origin. I am three generations removed from my immigrant roots and the degree to which I identify with the Irish-American community (for example) is my choice. Until my son took up dancing, my involvement with that community was limited to green beer on St. Patrick’s Day. 

Russian Girls

When I lived in Russia, people would identify me as American, and then when they heard my Russian language skills they would begin to probe where my family was from, because of course I had to have some sort of roots in the Russian speaking world, with such a facility for the language, such understanding of the culture and people. I told them that my father’s family was from Ireland and my mother’s family left Pinsk, Belorus, but both families had immigrated to America over 100 years previously. Most Russians would then say, “Ah ha! We knew you had roots here!” and be satisfied.

What I did not say was that my mother’s grandparents were fleeing the Pogroms (and other anti-Semitic policies) against Jews. Why did I not say that?  Because I knew that self-identifying as Jewish in Russia would then create a local identity for me that came with its own baggage, one that I did not want to carry, apply a stereotype I resisted and would transform me from being “an American” to being “a Jew.” I have it very easy; after all, I am an American who can conveniently hide behind a very Irish name.

Kyrgyz Family

But the people who were born and raised in the Soviet Union cannot pick and choose how to self-identify. Their ethnicity (and, by the way, there Jewish is an ethnicity, not a religious choice) is stamped in their passports, can be heard in their names and seen on their faces. The moment I heard the names of the bombers, saw their faces, I understood that they were from the Caucasus region, as did every single person from the former Soviet Union. And, every single person from this area has a set of ideas and stereotypes about Chechens and Dagestanis (the accused bombers' mother is Dagestani ethnically, and the parents are currently living in Dagestan, a small area of Russia that borders Chechnya) that were then applied to these two young men, based on their ethnicity.

A friend of mine once told me that despite the fact that she is half Russian on her mother’s side and her passport reads “Russian” as ethnicity, her name reflected her non-Russian heritage and identified her as a minority ethnicity, because Russian names are formed thusly; first name, patronymic (derived from one’s father’s first name), last name. So, as an example, a typical Russian name would be Oleg Vasilievich Ivanov. This person’s sister’s name might be Anna Vasilievna Ivanova. Those middle names mean that their father’s name is/was Vasili. A formal name in the Soviet Union included these three names; this was and is one’s legal name. If one is introduced for the first time in a formal setting, one's full name would be used, including the patryonimic.

Central Asian Jews

Say that one’s mother is Russian, and one’s father is not–-not only would your last name remain identifiably not Russian, but your middle name would also show that your father was not Russian as well. And, being of a non-Russian ethnicity in Russia, you would be subject to teasing, harassment and pressure to assimilate (particularly for those who are half Russian), leaving behind all vestiges of your “non-Russianness” behind. In short, other ethnicities had to be more Russian than the ethnic Russians themselves. And, that assumes that you could pull off “looking Russian” in the first place.

The ethnicities of the former Soviet Union are extremely diverse–-the Russians, Belorusians, Ukrainians, and others are caucasians with European features. Others, primarily from the Caucasus region are typically dark haired, dark eyed and more similar to Italians or Greeks. Central Asians look Asian with their dark hair, darker skin, and eye folds, though perhaps not as Asian as what we Americans typically think of as Chinese or Japanese. I included some photos of the various ethnicities in this post. More historic photos of various ethnic groups of the Russian Empire taken before the turn of the last century can be found in the Prokudin-Gorski Collection at the Library of Congress. In the former Soviet space, you are immediately identifiable when someone looks at you or your passport, or even by the sounds of your name or your accent. Stereotypes and ideas about each of these ethnicities are part of the collective consciousness and how people order the world they live in.  These are not just Russian stereotypes but more or less universal stereotypes about the peoples of the former Soviet Union.  Kyrgyz or Uzbeks or Georgians have set ideas about Tajiks, Turkmens or Armenians as well as Russians, Ukrainians, et al. 

Russian Settlers to the Caucasus

For these reasons, asking a Kyrgyz why the Chechens in Kyrgyzstan did not and do not identify with Kyrgyz culture is an absurd notion. My husband’s response is, “Of course Chechens (or Russians or Volga Germans) in Kyrgyzstan don’t identify with Kyrgyz culture--they are not Kyrgyz.”  Nor would a Kyrgyz in Russia identify with Russian culture, despite the fact that he might be a citizen of the Russian Federation. As I noted in my last post, I used to ask all non-Kyrgyz I met in Bishkek a question:  “Who sent you here, the Tsars or the Soviets?”  I knew who to ask because I could tell who was ethnically Kyrgyz and who was not. I had a friend in Bishkek named Oleg whose family had been exiled to Kyrgyzstan under the Tsars more than a hundred years ago. Were I to ask him if he was Kyrgyz, or identified with Kyrgyz culture, he would laugh, look at me and say something along the lines of, “Look at me, can't you see? I am Russian, not Kyrgyz.”  I never knew a non-ethnic Kyrgyz person who actually spoke the Kyrgyz language, or identified with the Kyrgyz culture no matter how long his family had been there. Kyrgyz have expressed appreciation to me for my very elementary Kyrgyz language skills because “Russians never bothered.”   

The Emir of Bukhara - identified as Uzbek

Keep in mind, too, that the dominant culture of the Soviet Union was "Soviet culture," not local or ethnic culture, with a heavy influence of Russia thrown in. So, the culture that the parents of these young men in Boston were born into and brought up under (at least until 1991) was Soviet culture, their grandparents were Soviets, but also Chechens. Then, all of a sudden, there was no Soviet Union, Soviet culture and history was rejected as false. Their family looked (as did all the peoples of the Soviet Union) to their ethnic roots, their heritage. So, they went back to their ancestral homeland of Chechnya, and war brought violence and bloodshed. To escape those horrors, they returned to safer and more stable Kyrgyzstan for a while, where a new and equally foreign Kyrgyz culture was starting to reassert itself, before finally going to Dagestan for a short while then on to America.

I don’t know whether these young men identified themselves as American, Chechen, Dagestani, or “from Kyrgyzstan.” (Though I am sure that they would not identify themselves as Kyrgyz, as has been reported by the media.) I am not sure these boys themselves knew with whom to identify or whether they felt like they belonged anywhere.

And maybe that is the root of the issue–-that entirely human desire to want to belong to something, to someone, to a group, to a people, to a place and how elusive that sense of belonging seemed to these young men.

Growing Up Black in Nazi Germany

By Supriya Savkoor
 

Photo: Mohsin4376

True story: Hans Massaquoi—the son of a German mother and an African father—came of age in Germany in the era when Adolph Hitler’s popularity surged, right through World War II (and the ethnic cleansing of “non-Aryans”), and beyond. It's unbelievable that he survived, but he also never saw the inside of any of the concentration camps or gas chambers in which millions of European Jews perished. He, like most of his compatriots, didn’t even know of the existence of these death chambers until after the war.

I was stunned when I first heard about Massaquoi’s truly unique life. It was on the radio during one of my morning commutes back in January and, sadly, the story was actually part of his obituary. He'd died that day, at the ripe old age of 87. His passing marks the end of an era, and yet what a legacy he leaves behind. A full, rich, exceptional life—one I’m surprised that I, and perhaps you as well, had not heard about until now.

As soon as I heard about him, I looked Massaquoi up on the Internet. Turns out he’d written his autobiography in 1999 (and still we hadn’t heard of him?). I convinced my local library to order a copy, though it didn’t take much convincing. Soon, I found myself spellbound as I flew through the book.

Hans's grandfather, Momolo Massaquoi,
had been king of his Vai tribe in Liberia.
Amidst political infighting, he abdicated,
but continued to play an influential role
in Liberian politics and society.

(Photo: Mohsin4376)

Massaquoi was born in Hamburg, Germany, in 1926. His parents met when his grandfather, a member of African royalty, served as the consul general of Liberia in Germany, bringing over part of his large family. At the time, Hans's father, Al-Haj Massaquoi, was studying in Dublin, occasionally visiting his own father in Hamburg as well as wooing Bertha Baetz. Eventually, Bertha gave birth to Hans, or Hans-Jürgen, as he was named. When Hans was still a toddler, Al-Haj, reportedly quite the ladies’ man (whom Bertha could never get to the altar), left Germany.

Massaquoi’s upbringing in Germany was anything but easy. His loving, devoted mother took up a job as a nurse to support them both, but she was dismissed when Massaquoi was still a child (and, as he found out many years later, because of his race). He grew up way too accustomed to the constant racial taunts from other children—the most common one, which followed him everywhere for years, was Neger, Neger, Schornsteinfeger (Negro, Negro, chimney sweep)!—as well as the institutionalized racism in Nazi Germany at school and, later, at work. He became accustomed to stares and hearing that he was ugly, often from total strangers. Massaquoi’s stories about the savage cruelty he endured from teachers amd principals, with no recourse, as well as not being allowed to legally date or attend university (despite his ambition, thirst for learning, and impeccable academic record) is at times difficult to read. He learned to hate the way he looked as well as suppress his angst, even with his mother, whom he adored but did not want to hurt.

Still, in his innocence and naivete, the young Massaquoi proudly wore the swastika on his school uniform. He desperately longed to join the Hitler Youth movement along with his classmates and neighborhood friends. He was turned down for being a non-Aryan, of course, but he felt shame rather than anger at not garnering that very overt symbol of acceptance. He had also learned to revere the Führer, love his country, and fear and hate the Jews, right up until adolescence when he realized he was considered one of the "enemy.”

One of the most astounding stories comes early in his autobiography, when a school-age Massaquoi and his mother visit a new “zoo” in Hamburg. To their utter shock, one of the exhibits displays African people, tribals who had been captured, caged, and displayed like dangerous, wild animals. Massaquoi describes not only his shock and his mother’s outrage, but also their utter discomfort when the crowd, both inside and outside the cage, all begin staring at Massaquoi, filling him with bitter shame and contributing to the low self-esteem he continues to feel throughout his early life in Germany.

Later, when Allied bombs rain down on Hamburg during the war years, he and his mother make nightly runs to their nearest bomb shelter, as does everyone else in the city. One of the country’s largest industrial cities, Hamburg was considered crucial to supplying the German military with weapons and other essentials. Eventually, more than 40,000 of its citizens die from these war-time bombings, and Massaquoi constantly wonders how he, of all people, manages to survive.

After the war, Massaquoi works a few grueling years as a factory machinist, then as a jazz musician (at a time when jazz was considered the music of undesirable non-Aryans and thus banned), and finally as a black market smuggler. Obtaining a Liberian passport, he is finally able to leave Germany in the early 1950s. He makes the long journey by ship to Liberia, where he’s reunited with his long-estranged father and begins a new life. 

No spoilers here; you’ll have to read the book to find out about his interesting reunion with Al-Haj as well as the many other members of Hans’s royal family, including a brother he hadn’t known existed and a grandmother who summons him to Lagos, Nigeria. His adventures in Africa are fascinating, including his perceptions about race, ethnicity, family, and his place among it all. His adventures around Liberia range from rubbing elbows with the country’s elite, living for a time in squalor, and visiting rural tribal areas. (Regarding the latter, monkey stew, anyone?)

Somewhere along the way, Massaquoi, along with many young German men he knew, decides he wants to make his way to the United States, where he envisions a promising new life in the land of the free. When he finally arrives in the late 1950s, living on a third continent and the most diverse country of all, he’s stunned to discover not only segregation but another form of institutionalized racism, the hypocritical kind. Again, reunions with his German friends and family, American immigrants like him, prove surprising.

(Photo: Mohsin4376)

Because the numerous pictures in the book make no secret of it, it’s no spoiler to tell you that despite all the hurdles he has to cross, Massaquoi eventually achieves the American dream. He becomes the editor of African-American magazine, Ebony, marries, buys a house in a Chicago suburb, raises two high-achieving kids (one a doctor, another a lawyer), and regularly travels all over the world, interviewing the likes of world leaders and celebrities. (Photos in the book include one of Massaquoi pretend sparring with boxing champ Muhammad Ali and another in which he and his good friend, author Alex Haley, are poring over important-looking papers.) 

Though Massaquoi had always assumed he'd been the only black German during the Nazi era, he later learns there had been at least a few others, all of whom had perished in the concentration camps. On his return to Germany in 1966, two decades after he'd left, he's surprised to discover the country had been rebuilt as though it had never been through the war, was thriving, and had seemingly become as diverse as the United States. There was even a large subculture of mixed-race Germans, the result of American soldiers based in Germany after the war. He also pieces together the fate of friends, family, and nemeses in Germany and Africa from across the years. 

Massaquoi’s book, Destined to Witness, is not particularly prosaic, but it’s spellbinding nonetheless. If you can, get your hands on a copy. And RIP, Hans. You were a truly remarkable man.