Category Archives: Life in the Tax Haven

ANDREW Nana once asked for my opinion on the PRC. People often ask me about China, and I rarely give an answer that isn’t couched in a thick layer of irony. I blare ‘The East is Red’ in the background as I answer their question in such a way that they won’t make me defendContinue reading “Chinese Conversations”

“I think you’re wrong about the instinct for beauty. Human beings lost that when the Berlin Wall came down. I’m not going to get into another argument with you about the Soviet Union, but when it died so did history. I think of the twentieth century as one long question, and in the end weContinue reading “Living in the End of History”

The tax haven’s university library is interesting. It does not style itself as such, preferring to be called the Luxemburg Learning Centre. This grand title has not been challenged by any other institutions, the national library is content with its equally grand Bibliothèque nationale, but I fear this name signals something different, the LLC feelsContinue reading “Avoiding Library Taxes”

I first went to ISU I wanted to be a high school history teacher. I always wanted to get my Ph.D. in the long run but, for me, what was important was sharing my love of history, and there is no better group of individuals to share it with than a captive audience. As theContinue reading “Teaching an Old Continent”

I have a playlist titled “Killing Cops and Myself.” It is an eclectic mix of folk, folk-punk, and bluegrass whose central theme is not hard to discern. When I cleaned up the playlist so that I could share it with Andy (Weeks) I had a path I wanted the listener to go down. It isContinue reading “Killing Cops and Myself”

I never knew the Soviet Union. I never knew Yugoslavia. I never knew a Maoist China or goulash communism. In 1991 something tragic happened. Not only was the greatest experiment in human dignity ended but history ended, or it feels like it did. I never saw any of it. Those few bastions of human dignityContinue reading “Soviet Hauntologies”

Andrew (Weeks) has been describing my existence in the tax haven as “Robinson Crusoe-like,” and with good reason. The tax haven is incredibly lonely. People are naturally reticent to leave their COVID bubbles; other people are not hell, but they are still dangerous. This is compounded by the European Union’s digital COVID certificate (DCC) thatContinue reading “Library Passports”

I thrive on close relationships with my professors. Even in high school I thrived on the knowledge that my favorite teachers saw me as – at a minimum – intellectually competent or a serious thinker. At ISU I thrived of conversations with my professors. I felt as though I was proving myself as someone worthContinue reading “Thoughts of a Plague Rat”

I am constantly amazed by the lack of “natural” spaces in Europe. Near my little Luxembourgeois town there is a cemetery, a green promenade, and the Escher Déierepark, which is both a hilly trail, petting zoo, and picnic area. The hill is a steep climb – good exercise which I am in need of becauseContinue reading “New to the Old Continent”

I’m a graduate student in Luxembourg. When asked why I decided to go to school in a tax haven I have always shrugged my shoulders. I politely inform interlocutors that when I think of an answer – why did I travel across the world in the middle of a pandemic? – I will let themContinue reading “Welcome to the Tax Haven”