WeblogPoMo: Ask me Anything

I had like 3 blog posts lined up for last month but got stuck on two of them and didn't feel motivated enough to write the third one (yet). That means I've broken my streak of posting every month, but that's fine – it'll all come later eventually. Instead, I found out about the latest WeblogPoMo challenge via Robb and felt compelled to participate. Essentially, it's an AMA where you answer questions that other people have answered before and/or you add new ones to the pile!

The idea probably works best when executed continuously (i.e. making a new post for every new question), but since that's not really the style of my blog I'm just going to aggregate my answers in this one post. If you want to know my answer to any question you have, ask by @ing me on Mastodon or commenting on this post directly, and I will amend my post accordingly!

Without further ado, let's start with the question I'd like to add to the pile.

What's your favourite "good, easy, cheap" food to make?

(from me!)

To clarify, with this question I'm asking for something you are very comfortable making and that works as a sort of fallback for you if you don't have the resources to make anything else.

I started a series of posts this year in which I present exactly those kinds of dishes. If I had to pick one, it would definitely be the first entry: lentils, rice and yogurt. The ingredients for it are always available, it's low-effort and it's really delicious.

What's the best music-related experience of your life so far?

(from Hiro via Gabz)

I have a couple strong contenders here. My first Team Scheisse concert where the entire venue turned into a mosh pit. Being hypnotised by the neverending solos in an underground Paris jazz bar. Raving to Nik's live set at GPN22.

But I think I'll go with a concert I went to in May of this year. We have this tiny venue here in Karlsruhe called Alte Hackerei which hosts pretty frequent concerts usually situated somewhere in the realm of punk rock. The first time I ever went to one there was to see MDC, which is a pretty well-known name in the hardcore scene. It wasn't only them that evening though. An Australian band called Private Function (bandcamp) whom I'd never heard of played as well. Their energy at that gig was so insane that they stuck with me. Unfortunately, the audience wasn't super receptive that evening (most were only there for MDC), and I was more watching from the sidelines.

Fast forward to their second concert at that venue, the one I'm actually talking about. This time, I knew their music, and I knew how nuts these people were on stage, and I knew I wanted to really get into it this time. It was probably the most fun I've ever had at a concert. Between random techno interludes and Wii-Shop remixes from their bassist Mila, the singer Chris spending more time off stage than on stage — climbing around on the bar, getting in people's faces and feeding them grapes and beer — the handful of people right in front of the stage (including me) gleefully slamming into each other the entire time, and the whole band going so hard that it was barely recognisable what they were playing anymore at certain points – I fucking loved every second of it. Here's one of my favourite songs (with a great music video) of theirs, but I cannot stress enough how batshit crazy they are live compared to their recordings.

As a bonus on top, there was another band there that evening that I'd also never heard of before but who I now listen to on the regular as well: DARTZ from New Zealand are also putting out some serious bangers.

What's the one place you haven't traveled but would love to?

(from Brandon via Scott)

It's hard for me to pick the place, since there are so many places I would love to visit one day that I haven't been to yet. I'm relatively well-travelled for my young age, both due to the privilege of having yearly family vacations and the geographically advantageous position of being in Germany. But with one fairly recent exception, my travels have always been limited to Europe, and I've often revisited the same places or countries.

One thing I know I still want to do in my life time is to travel to South Korea and/or Japan. Both countries are super interesting to me, in terms of culture, cuisine, geography and history. I put them together as one "travel goal" because I would probably use the chance to go to both on a longer vacation (as it turns out, getting to the other side of the world is expensive as fuck). Please don't call me a Koreaboo for this, but the reason I have this ambition to begin with is pretty cliché. Over the last 2 years or so I've enjoyed a bunch of Korean cultural exports (K-Dramas in particular), I've started cooking Korean food pretty regularly, and I've made friends with a bunch of Koreans when I lived in Paris last year.

So yeah, I guess my answer is South Korea. Though I would use the chance to drop by Japan as well.

What's the first movie, ever watched that made a big impact on you, for good or bad?

(from Gabz via Robb)

This is a tough one, mainly because my brain seems to be awful at preserving childhood memories. So it may well be the case that there is some movie that was more important to me, but I know of at least one that I used to watch all the time, and it's a pretty strange one: A Hard Day's Night (yes, one of the Beatles films). It's been quite a while since I've last seen it, but I remember almost every scene pretty clearly in my head. It doesn't really have a noteworthy plot, it's more like an amalgamation of practical comedy and music videos, kind of a mockumentary following the Beatles (who play themselves).

I was a big fan of the Beatles as a kid (a trait passed down from my father) and watching this movie used to make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. It's also pretty funny, although I'm guessing if I rewatched it today I'd probably have to look past some amount of sexism. I can't really articulate the impact it had on me, but it was probably the first movie that found its way into my heart.

How would you explain cryptographic signatures to a curious baker?

(from Matt)

Realistically, I would explain it as I would to any other layperson: using the analogy of the way letters used to be sealed by aristocrats. Or perhaps official stamps on documents.

But... this probably wasn't the point of this question. What baking-specific knowledge could be advantageous in understanding cryptographic signatures? I thought about it for a while but couldn't come up with a satisfying answer. Here are two ideas anyway:

• something with "signature recipes"? verifying that a recipe is from a particular person idk this probably doesn't make sense
• something with supply chain verification - ensuring that an ingredient comes from where you think it comes from (certain type of cocoa beans etc)

Sorry to disappoint here, but I've got nothing better...

What made antifascism important to you?

(paraphrasing Lou)

Fair warning, this one is a lot heavier than the others.

Growing up in Germany and in Berlin especially, you are faced with the historical atrocities of this nation at every turn, even if you don't pay attention. When you walk down a street in any German city¹, you will certainly encounter "Stolpersteine" (stumbling stones) – special stones in the pavement with a plaque remembering a victim of the Nazis who lived in this very location. In school, you learn about all the details of the fanaticism, the horror, the industrialised extermination of human life. You will most likely see it with your own eyes on an excursion to a concentration camp.

And yet, you are aware of the fact that there are still far too many people who know exactly what happened and who want to do it again. You consider it a fringe group, despised by the vast majority of your country. Denazification was largely a success, you are told, it's nothing to worry about anymore.

Then you learn what really happened after World War 2 – almost nothing. You learn that over 50% of Nazi judges stayed in their positions in West Germany. That the second chancellor in the history of this democratic country had been a member of the NSDAP, Hitler's party. That in the east, the Nazism that lived on in people's heads was simply ignored by the self-declared anti-fascist state. You learn what happened after the reunification – the spark of the German esprit ignited Molotov cocktails. Homes of immigrants burned. Those fringe Nazi mobs you thought everyone hated were, in fact, cheered on by regular people. A terrifying name for the 90s enters your vocabulary: "Baseballschlägerjahre" (years of the baseball bats).

While you're still in school, a Nazi terrorist organisation is uncovered that murdered 9 migrants over the course of 7 years. German press called those crimes the "Döner murders". Police never bothered to investigate properly – "probably just family disputes, that's what the Turks are like after all". Shortly after, an internal secret agency is caught destroying a bunch of files. Evidence will later point to the fact that this agency not only failed to act against the terrorists, but actively financed some of their supporters. About 10 years later, the new head of said agency will resign to become a fascist politician. This happens while Nazi cells within the German police force are discovered throughout the country.

Your uncle suddenly starts railing against mass immigration and human traffickers. What he means by human traffickers are NGOs that rescue drowning people in the Mediterranean Sea. You see this more and more: supposedly, Germany is overrun by foreigners who abuse our social systems and also steal our jobs. They say we must not help them lest we create our own downfall. You think, surely those people don't just want to let them drown? The answer to this question hits your naïve soul hard. Later you will see videos of the Greek coastal guard actively drowning an overfull boat of defenseless migrants. You understand now that this is the inevitable and desired conclusion of the calls for a fortification of Europe.

In your current left-liberal coalition government, an attempt is made and partially succeeds in criminalising sea rescue. The European Union de facto abolishes the right to asylum. Your social democrat chancellor says that "we finally have to deport on a grand scale". You recall that time in school where you hosted a political debate with local politicians, one of them being a member of the fascist AfD who are now polling at around 1/3 of the vote in the east. You don't remember the politician's name, but you notice that there is barely a meaningful difference between what he advocated for in this debate and what is actually happening now. You also remember him saying that he wanted Germans to finally be proud again of your ancestors' heroism between 1939 and 1945.

Most people will say they're opposed to fascism if you ask them. A majority of those people will tell the truth. However, when you ask those people how their beliefs manifest, it tends to get awkward. Out of the cowardly fear of seeming too radical, many people will rather stay at home than go to a protest against a local Nazi event. After all, there are a bunch of anarchists there! Many will even generally understate or underestimate the importance of taking action against fascism. Getting rid of propaganda, outnumbering their rallies, building organisations. And yes, if push comes to shove, being ready to stop history from repeating by any means necessary. But this is the essence of antifascism.

This phenomenon of avoiding engagement with antifascism and opting to keep living in blissful ignorance of real-world consequences seems uniquely German to me. This is why the cause has become so important to me and why I find it very important to be vocal and active about it.