I was not looking forward to my trip to the American consulate. Over the past years and through my various travels I had become accustomed to check lists, long lines, and arbitrary requests whether it be from the student visa office in New Zealand or tedious process of obtaining a work visa in Mexico. These bureaucratic institutions tended to treat people as paper work or as inhumane coded strings of numbers. The 'person' behind the ink is only granted legitimacy if the correct T's are crossed and i's dotted. The greatest sin would be to allow someone the tiniest inch of personhood or look behind a missing document for a life story. Even our Passport pictures try to drain any character from the represented. We sit blankly staring at a flashing camera which tries to capture an image so that security can confirm its really 'us'. There is no laugh behind our plastic smile or good memories in our eyes, no this is the photo of 'me' and all the world can confirm my face matches this picture. It is not my laugh, not not my smell. No, we are just a 2D generic image.
In the dark early hours of the morning I reluctantly began the 6k bike ride to the American Consulate in Amsterdam to replace my passport. To make the situation worse as soon as I was out the door the light ‘sprinkle’ shifted to a steady stream of wetness. Fabulous. I was not sure what was worse, my soaked clothing or soaked documents. Yet, I remembered I had brought a baseball cap that could at least shield my face from the rain. Smiling I resumed my journey laughing about the cap on my head. This cap I was wearing was from the Muslim Brotherhood and featured Arabic writing and the sign for 'Free Palestine'. I was riding to the American consulate to replace my destroyed national booklet with drenched documents wearing propaganda from a radical Islamic group who has openly condemned the United States. What a great citizen. And why do you need a new passport? Oh yes, my next trip? What do you mean Palestine is not a country… fine Yemen? Syria?
However, regardless of my inner feelings toward my country at the American consulate I was surprisingly treated like royalty. Upon arrival I was immediately allowed to cut the already ten person long queue. "All American citizens move to the front of the line" the security guard called out. Once in the building apprehensively I approached the counter with my saturated and barely readable appointment sheet. The big stern serious man took one look at it and ... he...he smiled? He did not scold, but smiled. A human? A human at a bureaucratic institution--was this a side effect of my waterlogged state? No, his smile even spoke, saying, "perfect day for the beach I see. Go into the second room and make yourself a hot drink". So I continued into the building past the ‘foreign applicant room’ which at 8.30am was already completely full with foreigners timidly trembling holding their perfectly preserved stacks of starch paperwork hoping the white sheets would be a sufficient trade for a small visa sticker in their passports.
The second room, or the 'citizen's room', was brightly lighted, lined with cushioned seats, a coffee machine, and completely empty except for me and a picture of the Statue of liberty; prime company for any citizen--America in all her glory. Here too, the officials were to my surprise kind and helpful. Yes kind and helpful. I was not dreaming. They gave me new forms (rather than sending me out to find a shop to print out a duplicate) and did not require that I pay for postage. They chatted, called me by my first name, and even let me keep their pen. Three times a guard strolled in and asked if I was comfortable and if everything was all right.
This experience illuminates the strange underlying meaning of 'citizenship'. Purely because I have a gold eagle and blue cover on my passport was I treated like royalty. A mere label given to me at birth humanized me at the black iron gate in a security ridden building, an area of containment for some or an oasis in a foreign land for others. I couldn't help but think how arbitrary nationalism is. We are all people. We all eat, breath, love, hate, sleep, and sometimes snore. However, unlike the other 'strings of numbers' sitting on hard chairs only ten feet and a wall away in the 'non-citizen room'. I comfortably sat sipping coffee re-scribbling my personal details on new forms. I was allowed human traits, like being called by my first name and was given pen to write it. This division is ludicrous. Why cannot we recognize that having "hawaii" under place of birth is no different than, "Nairobi". In both plots of land people fall and love and produce children (ok sometimes with out the love part). However borders and bureaucracy complicate and strip of us our humanity when outside our allocated ‘areas’. It was in this 'oasis' that I both hated and loved my ‘landed’ luck. Still, I found my self wishing that there was some way to change chance and perpetually presuppose personhood over national labels. Yet as I peddled away from the iron gates the gray skies and pouring rain reminded me how dire and destitute such thoughts are in an age valuing place over people. It will be along time before people come before paperwork and passport identity. Thus I consequently pulled on my Muslim brotherhood hat over my eyes and peddled away like a good ‘citizen’.
