I have begun to think of my housing, Hotel Jansen as a home. It has been the life source of my happiness here in Amsterdam and I feel that without this community my time here would be incredibly different. First of all, I wake up usually to the smell of fresh baked bread drifting through my window which, if you have never experienced this, is probably the best way to wake up. In my own single I then usually read for a bit and make breakfast in the communal kitchen. Each floor has a kitchen that is shared and I am extremely lucky to consider my floor mates close friends of mine at this stage of my experience. The hotel Jansen kids come from all over the world and some of my fifth floor friends are from places including Poland, Brazil, Singapore, Chile, and Japan. This has been extremely fascinating because overtime I walk into the kitchen there are foods and fragrances that I have never experienced and everyone is kind enough to share with each other. Many nights we all end up cooking one meal and eating together. This part of my life here is my favorite time because with music playing, people talking and laughing, and good food sizzling on the stove, everyone can enjoy themselves even if people don’t even speak the same language. These seem to be universal pleasures that can be shared easier than I could have imagined even when language is taken away. It provides a space for me where I can have my own time in my room or walk over three steps to my neighbors room and hang out.
The location of Jansen has been another hidden gem. It is located next to a large body of water and a beautiful nature preserve where people sail, walk, run, bike, swim, and kayak. Many days if the sun finally comes out, which has been less often than not lately as the rainy season has set in, I will quickly hop on my bike and make the five minute journey to my favorite dock. On this dock I have had some relaxing times reading some wonderful books. One of my favorite things to do is to read because it is a large stress reliever and very entertaining obviously. That is why here, it has been a perfect outlet if i’m missing my Colby home with all of my friends. This has been a extremely wonderful discovery because the first few weeks here I did experience homesickness yet I didn’t have anything that would make me feel better. That heavy feeling would then follow me around the rest of the day. Now when I feel this way me and some Jansen friends will go to this dock and just listen to music and read.
Speaking of Hotel Jansen friends I am happily surprised to find that I have made some very close friends here. I found that only after a few weeks here I felt extremely comfortable with three of the people that I met here and they have made this experience rich so far. I realized that you can be in the most beautiful city but if you’re not sharing it with friends it doesn’t guarantee you a good time. That is why i’m so grateful to have met these people because they allow me to explore and experience Amsterdam at a new level. Overall Hotel Jansen has provided me with everything I need to make this time here memorable.
The first few weeks here have been wonderful and impactful. It has been humbling as a student from the US to learn that there is a community such as Amsterdam, so different than any i’ve been a part of in the US, that I can thrive in and even call home.
Many Dutch people generally do not seem to like Americans at first impression. For example, a few weeks ago, I went to a restaurant with some friends and was talking with a dutch student from my school. We were getting along fine, until he asked where I was from, to which I replied the US. He immediately grimaced and shook his head. This was the first experience I have had that made me feel ashamed to be from the US. This feeling continued after more experiences like this. Another example, was when me and some friends went to a comedy show and Americans were used as the butt of multiple jokes. It continued to make me feel slightly embarrassed to be from the US. This all changed when I brought these examples up to my Dutch professor, Myrte Jansen. She explained that although the Dutch people do not generally have a great opinion of the US as a whole because generally people from Amsterdam don’t like any tourist and she thinks that as a whole we can be perceived as arrogant. She continued to say that many individuals she has gotten to know from the US have been great. I realized this statement was similar to how I felt about the dutch people I have met. When I first got there, I thought every native was cold and standoffish. This impression continued to grow for a while when I would get teased harshly from local dutch kids I met or people from my housing. This caused me to feel like an outsider and a nuisance to Dutch people. This all changed one day when one of the students that was joking with me, told me I take things to seriously. She then broke into a very genuine smile and told me that a sarcastic sense of humor is something the Dutch are known for and I shouldn’t take it personally. After this I started joking with her and the other kids back in a similar manner. I was surprised to learn they didn’t take it in a rude way as I would have and they clearly enjoyed it. Since then, I was floored to find out how much I love spending time with local Dutch people. It is clear now that I was the one who was interpreting everything wrong. At Colby, we had looked at a picture of an iceberg that showed interpretations were a part of the iceberg below the sea level and this was my first experience that demonstrated this perfectly.
So far I have had more “Iceberg” moments like this. For example, sometimes people here do not say please and I took that once again as rudeness until Myrte explained to my dutch class that it is implied in certain situations. It is also common to never get married here and I assumed this meant there were less relationships. This was complete wrong of me because many people will still have partners and children they just never marry. All of these instances of me assuming things incorrectly have made me question how open I really am. I hoped going into this I would have kept more of an open mind yet I made some snap judgements I am not proud of. I am going to remind myself of this lower half of the iceberg that is unknown to me before I make any opinions. Going abroad is a huge privilege and i’m grateful to see that it is already effecting my life and character for the better.
During my three months of trekking through Eastern Europe, I will be conducting a research project. Through several interviews my topic has slowly began to shift and change. As of right now, I am looking at the ways in which queer art interacts with public spaces. I want to learn more about the ways that queer artists are attempting to reclaim public spaces—make them less heteronormative, even homonormative.
One of the people I have interviewed so far identifies herself as a queer, feminist artist. She produces visual art on a variety of topics, but I interviewed her in relation to her LGBTrashcan and Real Ladies Dinner Mural. For her LGBTrashcan piece, she was commissioned by the city to make a queer mural on a trash can that was located in a busy part of the city. The trashcan depicts Adam and Steve, a joking nod to the homophobic saying of “God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve.” Her second artwork is a feminist re-drawing of The Last Supper; the mural is a collage of vibrantly colored femme bodies, many of which that are naked.
Some of the questions that I have been asking my informants include:
Do you view your artwork as an act of resistance or activism?
What are your motivations for creating queer art in public spaces?
How do you interpret the impact of your art?
In what ways do people interact with your art?
Each of the interviews that I have conducted have been around an hour long, but I plan to reach out to most of the artists for follow up questions after transcribing my interviews. I am only in the beginning stages of my research, but I am excited that I can begin to visualize what my research paper and presentation may look like.
When I first came here I was excited to experience the history of the canals, dams and sea dikes that were spaced around the city of Amsterdam. I knew that Amsterdam was actually below sea level, and after reading more about the city I learned that it has been a continuous fight against the ocean surges and flooding for the dutch people. Amsterdam was built on peat bogs that slowly sink over time. Every hundred years Amsterdam sinks 1 meter.
I am most excited to explore the famous museums that Amsterdam has to offer. The top ones include the Anne Frank House, The Reijks, and the Van Gogh. I am slightly nervous to be away from my all of my friends and family yet I am confident and excited to meet new people. I have so far been cooking all my meals in the shared kitchen in my apartment which has allowed me to bond with people.
One of the greatest sources of dutch cultural immersion experience i have had is the Dutch Men’s squash league i joined. As a member of the Varsity squash team at Colby, i am fortunate to be able to study abroad, however, as i miss the beginning of our season, it is crucial that i keep my game up. So, knowing this, upon my arrival in August, i joined a squash club, met a coach, and he recommended some younger guys and a dutch league i could participate in. Throughout the semester i have become good friends with many local Dutch citizens through our shared bond and practice of squash.
This has been good for me both for my game and for my experience in Dutch culture. Two or three times a week I try to play with the members of the team. Furthermore, on 5 Friday nights throughout the semester, i have joined them in playing league matches across the Netherlands.
This has been a great experience for me as i get to travel with the team throughout Holland. I have seen two other major cities and two small local towns through my travel for these matches. It is great fun. The other men are always pleasantly surprised to hear that there is an american college student playing on the opposing team. It sparks great discussion. I have met some interesting people along the way and experienced some more local atmospheres.
The best part about playing in the league is that after every match there is a bit of a social hour with the opposing team. It is courtesy that the host team buys the other team beer and a platter of Dutch appetizers. I can’t decide which i like best – the free food or the free beer.
In my understanding, there is not a major ‘Dutch cuisine’. Rather, there are certain treats or snacks that are very Dutch. Obviously cheese and apple pie are major Dutch staples. However, they also love their fried food. The post match platters often include bitterballen, fries, and more (which i forget the names of but know they’re good!). Bitterballen is a sort of fried ball with a sort of meat filling. They are phenomenal and offer incentive for me to go play matches.
Squash and Bitterballen on a friday night in Holland and i can’t complain.
I am incredibly grateful for the many members of SquashCity Amsterdam and Frans Otten Station, who have welcomed me into their communities. It is easy to make new friends when playing a game I love. Most of the men I play with are anywhere from 5 to 20 years older than I am. They each offer me an interesting perspective on Dutch issues and history. Likewise, I engage with them about the state of American politics, and other intriguing aspects of American culture. Of the people and friends I have made abroad, excluding some of my closest friends in my program, those who I share time with on the squash court, will be missed the most. I will be forever grateful for their hospitality and willingness to share and engage in meaningful interactions with me.
Before arriving in the Europe I viewed the following countries we would visit as simply: the Netherlands: gay friendly, Germany: neo-Nazi territory, Poland/Czech Republic: gray. Each of these biases informed by progressive politics juxtaposed with the homonationalist future of the US, the effects of WWII, and supposed static result of communism in Eastern Europe. At the end of this program, I have realized the dangers of creating a homogenized view of Europe and have learned tremendously about the historical, cultural background of each country we visited. In this reflection, I will discuss my experience as I entered queer spaces and how my presentation was a determining factor in my acceptance within these localities.
To begin, I will start by talking about queerphobia in my hometown, Santa Ana, and my experience with physical presentations (we all have our own truths, though incomplete). In an interview, Judith Butler mentions the dangers of swinging hips on an effeminate male (presumably queer or at least read that way). In Santa Ana, this movement is also enough to be ostracized by society, to be targeted by the proclaimed cholas and cholos associated with gang activity. It is through this environment, I have found markers to cope and to conceal the hips I have morphed into hills, distract the brows I plucked into ocean waves, and starve the lips I smoothed into folded petals. And it is for my safety I return to the image of a straight, cisgender brown boy. I return to childhood because in this innocence I am read as without-sexuality by my grandmother who wonders when I will have my first girlfriend or my father’s friends who wish I would bring a Chinese girl home with me when I return from Asia. In this environment, I keep my ears open to listen to the “homosexual hearing” (Jose Munoz’s theory of messages only audible to queer ears) because in these words I live vicariously.
To be fair, it is not all queer people who share this risk. Actually within the cholx community the order is masculinity, meaning, butch lesbian women, trans men, cismen, masc women, etc. are all worthy of gaining respect. It is femininity that has no place and those that embody femme features are susceptible towards violence of any form. So, what does that mean for cross-cultural exchange and my study abroad in Europe? It means our physical presentation grants us, as queer people, entry into spaces that are temporary, subjective, and partial.
Over these three months I questioned how to navigate queer spaces. To so badly want to be seen as queer when people read me as straight. Berlin, which I quickly realized was the ultimate destination for queer individuals looking to explore their identity, fetishes, and engagement provided me the opportunity to explore my femininity. Wanting to be noticed by men in bars, but having them assume my female friend was my girlfriend made me question why my cropped shirt and hoop earrings were read as heterosexual markers. But, the most hurtful was not being invisible to men. The most hurtful was being mistreated by other queer people who saw my physical presentation as not-queer enough and too-conforming. In this statement, I am conflicted because on one hand I understand the courage of individuals to explore non-normative styles in places that punish these curiosities. For example, it would be difficult for me to imagine a non-hyper visible lifestyle by a queer-presenting person in Krakow, Poland. On the other hand, as a low-income person/closeted queer who simply cannot afford two vastly different presentations, being queer means operating within a medium that allows for transgression as well as conformity. Wearing makeup and feminine clothing in Berlin might elicit positive responses from strangers and free products from LGBT+ friendly clubs, stores, and restaurants (which happened). But this presentation needs to be adaptable when I return to Santa Ana so that I may move safely and be a respectful son to my parents.
First, I will mention an experience I had in Amsterdam in the beginning weeks of the program as I attended the Radical Queer Resistance Festival. During this conference, I participated in an event for queer femmes of color (each of these things I identify with) which was a comedy writing session. I sat next to an individual also identifying with these three characteristics who made it clear from the start I was not welcome in this space. This space was simply not for me. Even though I was also queer, femme, and of color, this did not matter. As we were in the session they proceeded to purposefully block my view by physically relocating their chair in front of mine although we were already sitting in pre-organized circle. As we passed around learning materials they would toss the paper and then the pens into my lap instead of handing them to me. They would also continue to stretch their body into my face and violate my personal space to the point I would have to reflect their movements to avoid being hit. In this rejection, I began to question my identities and if I deserve to embody them. What does it mean to experience Butler’s vulnerable subjectivity? To be potentially undone by a member of my own community? I only wore jeans and a heavy brown jacket with a face clear of makeup. Truthfully, I have never entered a queer circle back home, but I will state that my subtle forms of resistance in my queer presentation would be seen as radical from my community members. Would others look to me as the gatekeeper of the queerness? A position no one is worthy, capable, and deserving of.
In the second week of staying in Prague, my friend and I were on our way home from visiting the convenient store late at night. Right before walking up to the front door of our apartment we strolled past a popular LGBT+ bar named “q cafe.” In this moment, we caught the attention of a group of drunk queer individuals and one in particular that called to us shouting, “hey, you, we want a picture with you!” Thinking that she actually meant she wanted us to take a photo for her and her group of friends, we retracted our steps and joined them.
We would actually be the subjects of this photo along with her young Czech friends. As we began casually socializing with the group (making this moment more bearable) this woman started yelling at first me and then my friend to “shut the fuck up.” And in her aggression, I wanted to make sure my friend felt safe because according to the woman she wanted “to steal my girlfriend.” My friend who is Asian and identifies as lesbian was not asked to return this woman’s apartment or told how beautiful she was because the woman could sense her queerness. In fact it was because she was in her Asian alone, that made the subject of her sexuality irrelevant. And I, as a straight-presenting individual in that moment, would risk being physically assaulted to help my friend out of this situation. I could not see the wonderful person, queer activist, artistic organizer her friends outside the bar described her to be. We only experienced the violent, aggressive woman ready to assault two other queer people. In the US, we are constantly fed the rhetoric that LGBT+ people have formed a community to protect one another. This I believe to be true. However, sexuality is also invisible as well, so in order to be eligible for acceptance, even within our own community, you must be validated. The public groups of queer people in Utrecht, Berlin, Krakow, and Prague are all small is size and most people are well-acquainted with each other. Additionally for me as a brown queer, my entry is always up for deliberation as to maintain protection of other queer people.
Potentially these instances were my fault for not looking queer enough. To be clear, I am using the former statement provocatively. All identities are valid regardless of their presentation. Nonetheless, I cannot deny the emotional response elicited through my experiences in Europe. In the instances where I put on physical display my queer femme identity, I gained access to clubs, people, and interactions that were made possible by Berlin’s tolerance of alternativity. And contrary to the situation where I could not help my friend escape violence from other queer people, my fully realized presentation granted access for my classmates to the same resources I was thrown. But let me be clear, I completed this despite my brownness (not in parallel) because leaving two clubs in Berlin (separate occasions) I made conversation with multiple brown, queer men (who presented non-alternatively) rejected by the bouncer. Meanwhile, white gay men were filling the semi-empty dance floor. In conclusion, I have learned that our positions are both permeable and permeated by those around us. Although I am privileged to be given space abroad to exist, I must also recognize that we, queer people, also replicate toxic behaviors.
For my first post I thought it was appropriate to introduce myself and the program I am participating in for the fall semester. I am currently abroad with a program titled Women and Gender in Europe which travels to the Netherlands, Germany, Poland, and the Czech Republic. I along with nine other classmates have been taking classes with a professor who travels with us to these four countries. Together, we have attended lectures hosted by both NGOs and governmental organizations across Europe. These activist groups focus on a variety of topics such as sex workers rights, abortion services, immigrant communities, eradication of human trafficking, trans/queer advocacy, and many other issues.
My name is Kevin Muñoz and I am a junior at Colby College, double majoring in East Asian Studies and Women’s, Gender, Sexuality Studies. The reason I chose this program was to have a semester of my undergrad dedicated to studying critical theories. As I also engage in another area of studies, it is sometimes challenging for me to balance both disciplines equally. Thus, here I am in Europe and I have truly loved every minute of it (almost every minute).
I am hoping to use this blog to share some of the social issues relevant to each of the countries I am visiting. Additionally, I will position my identity within these geographical locations to reflect my own experiences as a queer person of color. While these countries are all located close to one another, they hold vastly different histories and cultural significances. Lastly, I am looking forward to sharing some gender/sexual theory in this blog and relate it to personal, potentially intimate experiences. As a trigger warning to potential readers, I will be discussing micro-violences as they pertain to gender, racial, and sexual subjectivity. Also, I will be touching on my visitation to organizations that focus on sensitive social issues, meaning if any of my posts effect you in a way you are uncomfortable with, please refrain from reading. You, as the reader, must also look out for your own well-being as well. For me, I want to lean into my vulnerabilities and trust that what I share with anyone who reads me will be used in a productive manner.
For my first post I thought it was appropriate to introduce myself and the program I am participating in for the fall semester. I am currently abroad with a program titled Women and Gender in Europe which travels to the Netherlands, Germany, Poland, and the Czech Republic. I along with nine other classmates have been taking classes with a professor who travels with us to these four countries. Together, we have attended lectures hosted by both NGOs and governmental organizations across Europe. These activist groups focus on a variety of topics such as sex workers rights, abortion services, immigrant communities, eradication of human trafficking, trans/queer advocacy, and many other issues.