Tag Archives: Life in the Tax Haven

My third semester has begun. Unlike when I first arrived, I am now fully cognizant of the despair and hopelessness that inhabits the halls of the tax haven’s university. But I began this semester happy. In Paris, I began reading Camus’s Myth of Sisyphus and I am (like most readers) in awe of his finalContinue reading “Sisyphus on Strike”

My MA thesis is temporarily and spatially about the French Third Republic, but it is really about liberals. My question is simple: why are liberals like that? “Like what?,” you ask (really no one asks but I appreciate your indulgence), but on an instinctual level most of us on the left know what I meanContinue reading “The Third Republic, Thrice”

I had a short conversation with a Belgo-Albanian friend the other day. She’s a fan of Raoul Hedebouw, a deputy in the Belgian parliament for their official communist party, The Workers’ Party of Belgium. He’s a good orator and she respects him for that, spot on with hypocrisy and a complete command of French andContinue reading “For”

Why does the tax haven even have a university? There seem to be two answers. First, before 1997 (when the university’s doors opened), locals who wanted a university education had to go abroad. Most went to France, – including the prime minister where he proceeded to plagiarize his thesis – some went to Germany –Continue reading “In Service of the Tax Haven”

How are people losing faith in institutions?! Since 2016 there has been no end to “good” liberals who are concerned with the rise of conspiracy theories (both real and imagined) and who are distraught at the lack of confidence Americans have in the mainstream media and “technocratic” institutions like the CDC, FBI, and CIA. SinceContinue reading “DULCE ET DECORUM EST PRO ECONOMY MORI”

I am devastated by the news that Bloomington-Normal DSA has voted to dissolve itself and I will write a proper post-mortem about the organization soon. However, I only found out that DSA had decided to dissolve less than 24 hours before returning to America for Christmas with my family, I have not had the timeContinue reading “Three Images of Masculinity”

Michèle said those words to me at a bar last night. She is right, the Soviet Union was not my toy to play with, indeed, it was gone long before I even came into this world. Michèle would tell me that it belonged to the people who lived there, I think it belongs to everyone.Continue reading ““The Soviet Union Was Never Yours.””

Before beginning this blog, I would write long comments under pieces of art on my Instagram. I wrote this when I was first in Angers on 29 October 2019. I’ve rewritten it slightly, but the core remains the same. The emotions I felt then and now are not the same, but they rhyme. In 2004Continue reading “Reconsider the Lobster”

I spend much of my life in the tax haven isolated. It sucks and Nana’s recent message that she is seeing someone makes me feel truly alone on the continent. But the brief moments of human interaction that I get are exhilarating. I went to see Andrew (Weeks) in Paris last week which helped greatly,Continue reading “Hookah Haven”

I spent Toussaint trapped inside my 425 € prison cell. To make the day go by a little quicker I decided to listen to Weezer’s Teal Album. The album is a collection of music covers by the band but there are two songs that stuck out to me. The first is their cover of NoContinue reading “Teal Toussaint”