the foolish American
If I could speak freely, I would say that this foreign country and my home country are equally cold and sinister, places where the basic needs of the common person are of no concern. But I cannot, because there are libel laws and crackdowns on the speech of foreign agents in this country that must not be named. I cannot, because the people back home in America drink Kool-Aid and call it wine. The sheen of freedom is paper thin, as flimsy as a moth’s wing and just as temporary.
Where I live, in this imaginary land - they are already making vaccinations mandatory in some regions. The problem is, the only vaccine here is not recognized by Europe or my homeland. On top of that, in this imaginary land I live in, they forbid all foreign vaccines, all of the ones from the West. If you take the local vaccine, it cannot be mixed with a Western one down the road and in effect, I could never go home if I take it, and soon I will be forced to take it. But it actually gets far more complicated. “But what about your embassy, surely they can help?” you might ask. The official policy of US embassies all over the world is to have zero involvement or responsibility in the vaccination of its citizens living abroad. Over nine million Americans live outside of the country and are left to their own devices in solving this. The policy began under Trump and continued under Biden, so put all of your partisan beefs aside and understand that this is how America treats millions of its citizens no matter who sits at the desk in the White House, as they make grandiose promises to have everyone vaccinated by a certain holiday.
It is just the same horse shit.
In this imaginary land, somehow Germans living here can go to their embassy and get a Western recognized vaccine. The Swiss can too. This almost makes things worse, as it is clearly possible, just not for me. They are expats, and I am just a migrant, a nobody.
Me, the foolish American.
The nights run long and restless. This simple plan to stay in lockdown for the time being, to never go out, to live a life of groceries delivered to our door, to walk the rooms for exercise feels so childish now. The walls are thick, but they will not protect me from what is coming. There are just a few places in the world where a tourist can get a Western recognized vaccine, but the means to get there, the mechanisms and obstacles are dizzying. The idea of a long, expensive flight back to New York and somehow coordinating a quarantine there, not once. but twice is soul crushing madness. It is a fragile promise to chase, and a very, very expensive one.
This is the life of an expat from the “greatest country in the world”.
A country where I pay my taxes on time.
A country with more global enemies than friends.
A country that “spreads and defends democracy” but does not practice it.
If you pull a wrinkled dollar bill from one of the drawers by my desk, a remnant from the last time I was home, it says “In God We Trust”. I don’t think so. Money trusts money, screw everything else.