“Well done is better than well said.”
Benjamin Franklin
Poor Richard’s Almanack, 1737
Diary of My Disastrous Law Career: From Harvard to Heaven Help Me
Chapter 3
Has your life ever been changed by travel? An unexpected trip to Venice, Italy, in the late 1990s changed my life. I was living in Hamburg, Germany, after graduating from Harvard Law School in 1996. At the start of my law career, all I had in a practical sense was an abusive job in Hamburg, Germany (see the previous post in these memoirs). I found life in Hamburg itself abusive, and I had landed there after abusive summer associate jobs elsewhere (see the first post in these memoirs). It was time for new action, starting with quitting my first job after graduation, and later taking a trip out of Hamburg. Venice saved my life, though nothing could save my disastrous law career. This blog is a memoir to illustrate why I left my career as a lawyer.
Before Venice, after leaving Lawyer Job 1 in Hamburg, we come to:
Benjamin Franklin
Poor Richard’s Almanack, 1737
Diary of My Disastrous Law Career: From Harvard to Heaven Help Me
Chapter 3
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| An unexpected trip to Venice inspired me to try to turn my sideways life right-side-up. Would it work? |
Has your life ever been changed by travel? An unexpected trip to Venice, Italy, in the late 1990s changed my life. I was living in Hamburg, Germany, after graduating from Harvard Law School in 1996. At the start of my law career, all I had in a practical sense was an abusive job in Hamburg, Germany (see the previous post in these memoirs). I found life in Hamburg itself abusive, and I had landed there after abusive summer associate jobs elsewhere (see the first post in these memoirs). It was time for new action, starting with quitting my first job after graduation, and later taking a trip out of Hamburg. Venice saved my life, though nothing could save my disastrous law career. This blog is a memoir to illustrate why I left my career as a lawyer.
Before Venice, after leaving Lawyer Job 1 in Hamburg, we come to:
Lawyer Job 2: Hamburg
After I quit my depressing and depressingly low-paying job at the first law firm in Hamburg, where I was paid less as a foreigner (and as a woman?) and harassed as a woman (and a foreigner?), a former colleague who left that firm for another top firm called me and said I should come work at his new firm; he said the culture there was much better. The firm was a then-recent merger of three firms, making it a large firm by the standards of that time and place; it has since been acquired by a much bigger American law firm. I was skeptical, but I liked this particular attorney who had always been kind; he was part German and part non-German, was familiar with American culture, and had sympathy for my culture shock. I agreed to go to an interview.
At the interview, I met two partners, and I was there to interview them perhaps more than the other way around. They seemed professional, and they promised a collegial work environment, but how could I know for sure? We continued to chat, and then I committed what would normally be a huge mistake for an interviewee, though not for an interviewer: I said that that was all the time I had for today, because I had another appointment to go to (ballet class, which I actually specified). I had nothing to lose, and wasn't sure I wanted to gain a position there at all. Believe it or not, I got the job.
Or should I say gig, as this was another contract gig like the one at the first firm, without benefits, and at the rate of the equivalent of $8.59/hour. I had told them what I was making at the other firm, so they gave me the same amount. I could have negotiated, and I learned as a child that every penny counts, yet what amount would I have negotiated for? $8.95/hour? Plus a hosiery allowance so that leg-starers could see new leg coverings? Yes, just as at the previous Hamburg law firm, German lawyers at the second Hamburg law firm had a fascination with my legs, staring at them daily, and sometimes accomplishing entire meetings without ever looking at my eyes. See previous post to see my legs. Back to the money: the firm wasn't going to pay me what they paid German lawyers, or what I would earn in the US as a lawyer. Should I have exited the law altogether? Was my ikigai going to emerge, my motivation, my bliss?
I still hoped that filling my resume with law firms, and engaging in some aspect of the practice of law, to show that I had been working and learning, would serve me well in returning to the US to practice. My then-husband still said he wanted to have a Chicago-Hamburg life. (Did he really, you might ask if you are a skeptic, or if you read the previous post?) In any case, that is what I was thinking when I took the gig at the second Hamburg law firm.
My new job started terribly. The lawyer to whom I was assigned to work was not one of the two in the interview, nor was it my colleague from the first firm who had switched to the second firm. It was a different lawyer, a man with whom I never had a conversation in person. He gave me assignments through his administrative assistant. If I stopped by his office, he wasn't available. If I saw him in the corridor, he didn't make eye contact. He didn't take me to lunch on my first day, or sit with me to discuss expectations, or do any of the things that you might expect or that were common in welcoming a new lawyer. He seemed to see me as a sort of paralegal even though I was a Harvard Law School graduate. There's nothing wrong with being a paralegal if you're a paralegal. But I wanted to grow as the lawyer that I was.
So, I started looking around the firm for other opportunities. I told my friend who brought me into the firm that I was going to do that, just as I had at the first firm, and he agreed it was a good idea. I had become professionally friendly with one of the lawyers from the interview; he had done an LLM in the States and like my friend had a much more open demeanor than many German lawyers, which made it easy for me to talk with him -- and he spoke back instead of ignoring me. I asked if he had any projects I could help with, and he did, such as American clients acquiring German companies or needing advice on operating German subsidiaries. Wonderful! Now I was getting more of the kind of experience that I would be getting in the States as a young corporate lawyer: doing due diligence (intense document review of a target company for a company that wants to buy the target), researching and writing memos, and sitting in on client meetings. Of course, again, I hadn't wanted to be a corporate lawyer but an intellectual property lawyer, but this was what was available and I was grateful for the chance.
There were certainly still obstacles to navigate at the firm, and I couldn't describe the culture at either Hamburg firm as empathetic (spoiler alert: the empathy quotient gets no better after Hamburg). For instance, the leg-staring outrageousness was again as prevalent at the second firm as it had been at the first firm. Should I have searched for my ikigai as a leg model?
There was a woman listed on the firm's materials as a partner, but I never saw her or met her. Did she exist? Was her name on the letterhead as a token? There was another woman who was a junior partner, but she kept her door closed and didn't network internally; my new mentor agreed that not mingling was not a good tactic. There were a handful of female associates, who wore pants while I wore skirt suits and dresses. One day when I asked a female associate how she was coping with some of the gendered challenges at the law firm, she said she thought I took equality too seriously, while I was astounded at her complacency. Maybe ignoring the problems was her way of coping.
There was a woman listed on the firm's materials as a partner, but I never saw her or met her. Did she exist? Was her name on the letterhead as a token? There was another woman who was a junior partner, but she kept her door closed and didn't network internally; my new mentor agreed that not mingling was not a good tactic. There were a handful of female associates, who wore pants while I wore skirt suits and dresses. One day when I asked a female associate how she was coping with some of the gendered challenges at the law firm, she said she thought I took equality too seriously, while I was astounded at her complacency. Maybe ignoring the problems was her way of coping.
Associates at the firm were sometimes competitive or felt threatened by me, and would shut me out of meetings, or try to make me look bad to the partners. For example, the associate who also worked for my partner wouldn't tell me when client meetings were, and tried to blame me for any mistakes or delays. I handled the situation by putting on a red skirt suit (as red is seen as a power color and this blog has fashion elements, doesn't it), going to the associate's office, sitting back in a chair very confidently, crossing my legs yet making sure he was focused on my voice, and telling him simply to stop being competitive with me. I told him I was a gig worker at this firm, wanted to go back to the US at some point, and did not want his job, so he did not need to feel threatened. I told him that I needed him to act like a professional, and that if the partner saw him working well with me, it would probably raise the partner's opinion of him. Then I invited him and his wife to one of my (vegetarian!) dinner parties. The associate altered his behavior, becoming professional and non-competitive.
I frequently had to turn away lawyers who asked me if I would translate documents for them. I turned them away politely, reminding them that I was a lawyer like them and not a professional translator, and that I would be happy to send the document out to a professional translation service and supervise the project. No one ever took me up on that. A translator would have charged more than they were paying me.
Another problem: I had to fight for every little thing which was automatically distributed to the German lawyers. Here is an example, which also highlights the fact that many of the lawyers I worked with loved to hear themselves talk, and would keep me on the telephone or in their office for longer than needed (maybe sometimes they just wanted to look at my legs, but they couldn't do this on the phone so I believe in those cases they truly wanted to hear the sound of their own voice). It was announced that everyone would get new phones with caller ID; this was still relatively new technology in Germany at the time, and innovations were becoming available as the previously monopolist telephone company now had competition. The concept of "everyone" at the firm didn't include me; I didn't get a new phone and still had to answer without knowing who was calling, which was a problem because callers within the firm had stopped introducing themselves, figuring that everyone could now read the phone display to see who they were talking to. I asked an admin if a caller ID phone could please be provided to me too, and was told we didn't have any more. Yes, that's why I'm asking if we can please get me one. While that was (not) being sorted out, and everyone was raving about how much they loved having caller ID, I answered my phone, and one of the German attorneys began telling me about a project he had for me. It sounded like a fine project. Only I didn't know who he was. The lawyer launched into a lengthy explanation of the project, as I've noted was common, and I used that time to pull out a sheet of letterhead and cross off the names of who it was not, narrowing down the possibilities. I still couldn't pinpoint who it was. The lawyer kept talking, and talking, and I went down the letterhead a second time. It had to be someone with whom I hadn't worked before, but that left quite a few people and I still couldn't be sure who it was. Finally I asked: Thank you for this very interesting project which I will be glad to complete, but as I seem to be the only person not given a new caller ID phone, I don't know who you are and must ask. Silence on the line for the first time. I think the lawyer was not so much surprised that I didn't have a new phone, as that I didn't recognize his voice which he loved so much. It turns out it was one of the three managing partners.
Amidst the mayhem, to be fair, there were positives. Here is the story of a positive innovation I created for the firm: I noticed that the firm had no database of English-language contracts, even though they had a need for this, so I created, gained authorization for, and implemented a plan to develop and manage such a database. The firm had significant clients who required contracts in English, either because the clients were from the US, or because English was the default language between say German and Japanese parties. Some partners kept personal files of contract templates, which I had observed were of widely varying quality and format, and reflected a range of English proficiency. Having a database of templates is standard at US firms, and I decided that I could create and manage one for the Hamburg firm, which would display consistent quality and cohesive branding to clients, and would save time for German lawyers who would no longer have to create new contracts from scratch in a language foreign to them, but who could start with a template written by a native English-speaking Harvard lawyer -- and they could tell that to clients, too. Creating this database was not within my job description, and if I simply started, I doubted that I would gain buy-in from the German lawyers because this was a new idea that they might not be motivated to support. The way to proceed was to find a champion for this project. Happily, my boss was one of the three managing partners; I approached him with my idea, explained how it would help the firm, save time and money, and benefit American and other clients while boosting the firm's image and professional reputation. He loved it. Soon I was receiving large volumes of contracts from the firm's German attorneys, I revised the documents into fluent language that met all legalities and would make sense to American or other English-speaking clients, and I gave the contracts a consistent format with appropriate and uniform firm branding. I maintained the database I had created, making sure that people got the right template for the right transaction, and everyone was happy. I mentioned that the firm was later acquired by a much larger American firm. Coincidence? :)
It felt good to contribute a meaningful enhancement to the firm through the database I created, and through other ways I added my expertise and energy. According to business theories of the importance of innovating and taking initiative at work, I should have become a highly-paid, well-respected, irreplaceable pillar of the organization for doing the kinds of things I did, right? That didn't happen, however. Was there a future for me as an American attorney at this firm? I spoke with the partner I worked for, and the short answer was no. Not if I meant being a "real" lawyer listed on the firm's materials and being paid a real lawyer salary like the German lawyers were. The longer answer was that he could get me a bit more money, though no benefits, and was very glad to have me on the team. And who knows what the future would bring, right? Side note: developing an entrepreneurial project, or intra-preneurial in the sense of creating a new project within an employment environment, was more exciting and meaningful to me than corporate law work; could this be a sign?
Terrible lesson: even with a positive relationship with a powerful sponsor, I could still have a dead-end career, whether measured by respect, or money.
Positive lesson: I was still making the best of bad situations, and had even found a way to become an "intra-preneur" at the law firm by keeping my eyes open for opportunities, solving an organizational problem, and creating real and enduring value that exceeded expectations. I had also found a wonderful sponsor (spoiler alert: there wouldn't be another), from whom I was learning a great deal, and I found ways to turn at least some enemies into friends.
Side Note: Lights, Camera, Action, or Actions of a Foreigner
On our theme of taking action, here is a side note to provide some comic relief: I went to German language lessons a couple of evenings a week to further perfect my fluent German, and to meet and interact with more people as we extroverts need to do, and I helped the teacher form our class into an all-foreigners German-language acting club! We held only one performance, featuring skits in German, for an audience composed mainly of our spouses and friends. Though I had acted in college, as an ensemble we were for the most part so bad we were good. :) Still, it was a meaningful experience, and the process gave us extra confidence in speaking the language of our new adopted country. This kind of confidence could be particularly useful if you wanted to talk back to people shouting at you in the post office or bakery or on street corners for example, as some of us found that daily life for a foreigner (or in some cases for a native) in Germany could be somewhat hostile, especially until you found the right shops and whatnot.
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Comic relief: all-foreigners German-language acting troupe from my advanced German class.
Back row left to right: classmate from England (very sweet girl), our German teacher (delightful), another classmate from England, yours truly from the USA, classmate from Argentina (something of a playboy).
Front row, left to right: classmate from Poland (very nice person; I remember he almost cried when my husband and I gave him a bottle of Polish vodka after he said his country sold and exported their quality vodka at prices most Poles couldn't afford), classmate from Peru (an architect who had married a German woman and relocated to Germany; contrary to the belief of lawyers at my 2L summer firm, sometimes husbands besides my own relocated to where their wives were from), classmate from Indonesia.
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What's this about the hostility of daily life in Hamburg at that time? A few examples:
When I first spent time in Hamburg with my new husband in the early 1990s, I was exploring the downtown area one day, and as I strolled along Jungfernstieg, the busy shopping street along pretty little manmade Lake Alster, I dropped some coins into the instrument case of a musician who was performing on the sidewalk. As I walked past, he stopped playing, grabbed the coins, rushed up to me, and shoved the money at me that I had just given him, saying the amount was too small. I was horrified. I took my money back and walked away. Should I have found out the going rate for street musician donations before donating anything and insulting this performer? Why did he harass me when I gave him something, instead of harassing the many people who walked past and gave him nothing? Why didn't he stop them and tell them that a donation of zero was too small? I never gave money to a street performer in Germany again.
Then we come to a couple of shouting examples. My husband and I went to the post office, because we had some local letters to mail, and I had a package of small gifts to mail to a former Harvard Law School classmate back in America. Supporting my view that Germany is not efficient so much as predictable, there were separate lines at the post office to complete different tasks. You couldn't mail overseas packages and domestic letters in one transaction. You had to get in different lines to do these things. That is orderly, but not efficient, and of course the focus isn't at all customer service the way we expect in the US; Germany has a different culture. So, I got into the international package line while my husband got into the domestic letters line. My line moved faster, and when it was my turn I placed my package on the counter, smiled, and said Guten Tag. The post office clerk said, aggressively, What do you want to do with this? Taken aback, I replied, Well I'd like to mail this package to the US. He started shouting at me that I should have said that in the first place, not just pushed a package at him, and on and on. I was horrified. My husband jumped out of the domestic letters line and told the man in a low but forceful tone that he had better stop shouting at his wife and that if I showed up with a package of course I wanted to mail it what did he think and he had better do his job and stop acting in this ridiculous manner. The post office worker instantly shrank, the way many bullies do when bullied back, understanding only dominance, and mailed the package without further outburst. Had he bullied me because I was a foreigner, which was always clear in Germany by my look and my accent? I hadn't heard him bullying the Germans in line ahead of me. Had he backed off when my husband approached him because he could see and hear that my husband was German? I was grateful to my husband for defending me and for defending good manners, and after mailing the international package, we got back into the domestic letters line.
More shouting: What do you do if you are walking and come to a red light when there is no traffic? Do you wait for the light to turn green, or do you walk across the street on the red light because there are no cars? One rainy evening (there was so much rain in Hamburg), as a pedestrian, I came to a red light, saw there were no cars, and started to walk across the street. A man on the curb which I had just left shouted at me that it was terrible of me to cross the street against the light and how dare I do such a terrible thing! My husband wasn't there to defend me. I decided to use my own approach. I walked back to this street-shouter and asked him in a normal tone of voice why he felt that way. He said that I was setting a bad example for children, teaching them to cross the street against the stoplight. I considered this, and replied that there were no children on the street on this rainy evening, why is looking both ways and crossing the street safely to get out of the rain necessarily a bad example, and wasn't it a bad example instead to shout at strangers on the street? He ignored most of that, and exclaimed that children could be watching from windows, seeing my bad example! I broke the rule again, re-crossed the street in my original direction, and hurried away.
Wasn't my status as a woman as well as a foreigner at play in these situations? Didn't men on the street, in the post office, and in the law firms see a woman and figure that I was not a threat to them, and decide that I was an easy target for bullying? Isn't that how patriarchy works, as it is based on the premise that men can bully and oppress women, with no expectation of consequences for such actions? What if we women decide not to play along? What if, as Gandhi demonstrated when India was oppressed by Britain, we decide not to cooperate with or participate in oppression?
I saw anti-foreigner sentiment against men too. For example, we lived on a leafy square in a quiet neighborhood, and at one point, temporary housing made of shipping containers was constructed for Kurdish refugees from Turkey on an undeveloped part of the square, under some trees. A neighbor invited us to a party with some other neighbors. Everyone was sipping prosecco and munching hors d'oeuvres, and the hostess mentioned that she didn't like having the foreigners on our square. I replied that immigration was certainly complex, but they had come to escape serious problems, and maybe we could find a way to help them feel welcome here, or contribute toward some solution. She was surprised at this perspective, and I added that there was one more foreigner living elsewhere on our square. She asked with some horror, Who?? I replied, Me. She knew I was American of course, but I had some privilege as an American married to a German, which refugees did not have. She walked away and never spoke to me again.
I sure had culture shock. Apparently, I couldn't walk down the street in Hamburg or go to the post office or a neighbor's party without embroiling myself in some sort of cross-cultural outrage. Nor could I seem to use my Harvard Law degree in a practical or sustainable manner. I tried to look at my environment from a detached perspective, as an anthropologist might: observing without judging, experiencing the culture without taking it personally. It wasn't always easy to feel good when people were trying to make me feel bad, though. Did I want my life to be one involving a constant need for emotional detachment in an environment I didn't fit into, or did I want to live a joyous and meaningful life, with ikigai to enjoy every day?
Terrible lesson: While I've always found I can meet nice people anywhere, life in Hamburg was full of bullies in daily life. Even if I could have adapted, did I want to?
Positive action: I can speak out and take action based on my principles.
An important note: the Nazi history of Germany was often present in daily life. If you drive out of Hamburg toward Frankfurt, where my husband's parents lived at the time, or toward Munich, you take the A7 north-south expressway (yes, this is part of the Autobahn, which is the federal highway system). An hour outside of Hamburg, you pass Bergen-Belsen death camp, where Anne Frank and up to 100,000 others were murdered by Germans during World War II. When the British liberated the camp in 1945, they found 10,000 unburied corpses. Click for this Time Magazine account and graphic photos taken in 1945; discretion advised.
Almost every night on television, you could find a documentary about some aspect of the Nazi era. For example, I watched a fascinating documentary where former SS officers were interviewed. One was broken by regret over the unconscionable acts of murder he had committed against Jews and others. Another seemed to be an unrepentant sociopath.
I had studied European History including the Holocaust as an undergrad at Harvard College, and was impressed on the one hand that many Germans learned about and acknowledged details of their recent Nazi history, in contrast to how so many people in the US did not learn about or acknowledge details of our slavery era. On the other hand, having developed a guilty conscience, Germany didn't seem to know what to do with it, and inward anger continued to turn outward.
You can see why I needed a vacation.
Vacation: Venice
Amidst this daily turmoil, my husband and I received an invitation to a masked ball in Venice. It was being held by the brother of a friend of my husband's. I wanted to go! My husband didn't. He had become more and more reluctant to leave the house except to go to work, and we had missed many events large and small, including my 5th-year Harvard College reunion and the wedding of a college friend of mine. I had to accept that my husband's illness wasn't something I could help by staying home with him, and he wouldn't accept medical help for his symptoms which included paranoia, mood swings, and auditory hallucinations.
So I went alone. And Venice changed my life. First, though, I had to find a costume. The theme of the ball was "16th or17th Century European or Arabian." I went to the consignment shop I had found in Hamburg where I and other petites in the non-petite-friendly city (and country) could find petite clothing. In fact, I had what today we would call a micro business, buying new small-sized clothing in the US, and selling it to the woman who owned this shop, for her to resell. Prices for US designer clothing were high in Germany, and there was demand, so it was a nice little supplement to the $8.59/hour I made as a lawyer (just writing "the $8.59/hour I made as a lawyer" seems ridiculous). Plus, it was fun to walk into an establishment in Germany where the owner was happy to see me, instead of where the staff found some reason to shout at me. At the shop, I found an exquisitely embroidered Yves St. Laurent ensemble that was perfect, as the Algerian-born French designer was so deeply inspired by Morocco. The outfit consisted of black-and-gold flowing trousers and bustier, with a little salmon-and-gold jacket. Sadly, I no longer have the outfit, or photos, but I still have the handmade gold mask I bought in Venice to go with the outfit, and this takes us into how Venice saved my life.
I flew from Hamburg to Venice, a 1 hour and 45 minute flight, and took a water taxi into the city from the airport. This was my first time in Venice -- I've been back once so far -- and I was instantly enchanted by this magical aquatic and artistic improbability of a place, so full of not only the beauty and history that we think of, but also full of kindness, gentleness, and a live-and-let-live attitude. It was also striking to me that while Venice was quite frankly filthy and crumbling, it was also noble and beautiful. Most local people were not rich, but they were warm and kind. By contrast, Hamburg was sparkling clean and pristine, a wealthy city, and overall I found the people cold and mean and unwilling to consider any way but theirs. Venice awakened me to the realization that there were other ways to live besides the dark unhappy way I had been living in Hamburg.
For example, after my fabulous boat ride into Venice, I made my way to my hotel, a modest and charmingly old-fashioned little spot on the Dorsoduro. From there, I set out to find the gold mask I wanted to go with my outfit for the masked ball the next day. On the way, I stopped at a drugstore to buy a hair band. (Do you notice too that you either have half a dozen or none in your bag at any given time?) The cashier was smiling and friendly, and wrapped up my $0.75 hair band in a cute little piece of wrapping paper, and tied it with a ribbon! Adorable! I thought: Wow, she knows I'm a tourist, and wants to welcome me, and so has turned my purchase into a special gift!
Then I saw a chocolate and pastry shop nearby, and popped in of course; usually such a shop is my first stop on any trip! I loved browsing the chocolates and confections and beautiful tins, and made a selection of a few bonbons and a pastry or two. The woman behind the counter was cheerful and delightful, and she wrapped up my items with wrapping paper and ribbon! Wow, I thought, she knows I'm a tourist and is giving me the special gift treatment too!
I couldn't resist a pair of shoes on sale at another shop -- why resist Italian fashion? Even though my Italian is rather terrible and was even worse back then as my brain was full of German (and French), I could always say my shoe size in many languages, including trentasette in Italian, which means 37 and translates to a size 6 1/2 or 7 shoe in the US! In any case, you won't be surprised to hear at this point that the store worker was very friendly, or that she wrapped my purchase in wrapping paper with a ribbon!
The wonderful people at the mask shop performed the same wrapping artistry, after helping me choose just the simple yet elegant gold mask I envisioned to go with my elaborate gold-brocaded YSL Moroccan-style outfit for the Arab-Europe-themed ball! Formed of paper mache, covered in gold leaf, and tied with a black silk ribbon, all fashioned by hand, the mask for me was an unveiling of happiness.
Not only were artisans and shop-workers kind, warm, and generous, so were people on the streets and along the canals. Museum guards didn't cast strict glances as in Germany; they smiled and chatted, or even yawned good-naturedly and turned away to relax in a chair, while I perused a Tintoretto or a Titian in peace! While crossing a piazza on my way back to the hotel, I noticed a nun coming toward me. She looked me in the eye and smiled a sweet smile as we passed, as strangers never did in Hamburg, and although I'm not a Catholic, it was as if the radiance of Heaven and Earth shined upon me. I knew it was time to change my life.
I had a marvelous time at the ball, held in a 17th century palace, arrived at by boat, naturally! How I wish I had the photos; then again, Venice is a mysterious place as you know if you have visited too, and there's nothing wrong with leaving some mystery in your mind about the beautiful setting and lovely music and costumes at the ball. After this short but significant 3-day trip, I returned to Hamburg, for the time being.
An irony: Hamburg was sometimes called the Venice of the north, but I found no comparison, literally or figuratively. Hamburg is admittedly a very pretty city, full of clean streets and small canals. You drive everywhere in Hamburg, or walk some places, or you could ride a bike or take the subway or bus. In Venice, built on 118 islands, the roads are water, the water is the road. There are no cars on the Grand Canal! In Venice, you are always on water or over water or near water or walking along water or thinking about water, or turning a funny corner and coming upon a little bridge over water. Public transportation is a boat, not a bus. And the wrapping paper and ribbons and smiles! Venice is called "La Serenissima," and gave me a serene feeling indeed, and a feeling of renewed hope!
Unfortunately, even worse than disasters at work, and disasters I encountered in daily life in Hamburg, were disasters at home. That incredibly kind person who was my husband had seemingly gradually and then rapidly exhibited schizophrenic behaviors, and he refused help. The circumstances of our marriage had deteriorated over the years due to these behaviors. I kept trying to save him, but have you ever tried saving someone who didn't want saving? My mother, family, friends, and boss in whom I confided all advised me to save myself before it was too late. My mother visited me in Hamburg, and I was grateful that she believed in me no matter what. I talked with my husband's parents, wonderful people, who were also alarmed by their son's condition but were powerless to help, and who were afraid that if I took him back to America I would have him committed, which they didn't want. My family loved my husband too, and they also loved me, and wanted to see me exit a dark situation in which my husband wasn't accepting treatment and continued to act in unpredictable ways, and I had no support system.
When I first spent time in Hamburg with my new husband in the early 1990s, I was exploring the downtown area one day, and as I strolled along Jungfernstieg, the busy shopping street along pretty little manmade Lake Alster, I dropped some coins into the instrument case of a musician who was performing on the sidewalk. As I walked past, he stopped playing, grabbed the coins, rushed up to me, and shoved the money at me that I had just given him, saying the amount was too small. I was horrified. I took my money back and walked away. Should I have found out the going rate for street musician donations before donating anything and insulting this performer? Why did he harass me when I gave him something, instead of harassing the many people who walked past and gave him nothing? Why didn't he stop them and tell them that a donation of zero was too small? I never gave money to a street performer in Germany again.
Then we come to a couple of shouting examples. My husband and I went to the post office, because we had some local letters to mail, and I had a package of small gifts to mail to a former Harvard Law School classmate back in America. Supporting my view that Germany is not efficient so much as predictable, there were separate lines at the post office to complete different tasks. You couldn't mail overseas packages and domestic letters in one transaction. You had to get in different lines to do these things. That is orderly, but not efficient, and of course the focus isn't at all customer service the way we expect in the US; Germany has a different culture. So, I got into the international package line while my husband got into the domestic letters line. My line moved faster, and when it was my turn I placed my package on the counter, smiled, and said Guten Tag. The post office clerk said, aggressively, What do you want to do with this? Taken aback, I replied, Well I'd like to mail this package to the US. He started shouting at me that I should have said that in the first place, not just pushed a package at him, and on and on. I was horrified. My husband jumped out of the domestic letters line and told the man in a low but forceful tone that he had better stop shouting at his wife and that if I showed up with a package of course I wanted to mail it what did he think and he had better do his job and stop acting in this ridiculous manner. The post office worker instantly shrank, the way many bullies do when bullied back, understanding only dominance, and mailed the package without further outburst. Had he bullied me because I was a foreigner, which was always clear in Germany by my look and my accent? I hadn't heard him bullying the Germans in line ahead of me. Had he backed off when my husband approached him because he could see and hear that my husband was German? I was grateful to my husband for defending me and for defending good manners, and after mailing the international package, we got back into the domestic letters line.
More shouting: What do you do if you are walking and come to a red light when there is no traffic? Do you wait for the light to turn green, or do you walk across the street on the red light because there are no cars? One rainy evening (there was so much rain in Hamburg), as a pedestrian, I came to a red light, saw there were no cars, and started to walk across the street. A man on the curb which I had just left shouted at me that it was terrible of me to cross the street against the light and how dare I do such a terrible thing! My husband wasn't there to defend me. I decided to use my own approach. I walked back to this street-shouter and asked him in a normal tone of voice why he felt that way. He said that I was setting a bad example for children, teaching them to cross the street against the stoplight. I considered this, and replied that there were no children on the street on this rainy evening, why is looking both ways and crossing the street safely to get out of the rain necessarily a bad example, and wasn't it a bad example instead to shout at strangers on the street? He ignored most of that, and exclaimed that children could be watching from windows, seeing my bad example! I broke the rule again, re-crossed the street in my original direction, and hurried away.
Wasn't my status as a woman as well as a foreigner at play in these situations? Didn't men on the street, in the post office, and in the law firms see a woman and figure that I was not a threat to them, and decide that I was an easy target for bullying? Isn't that how patriarchy works, as it is based on the premise that men can bully and oppress women, with no expectation of consequences for such actions? What if we women decide not to play along? What if, as Gandhi demonstrated when India was oppressed by Britain, we decide not to cooperate with or participate in oppression?
I saw anti-foreigner sentiment against men too. For example, we lived on a leafy square in a quiet neighborhood, and at one point, temporary housing made of shipping containers was constructed for Kurdish refugees from Turkey on an undeveloped part of the square, under some trees. A neighbor invited us to a party with some other neighbors. Everyone was sipping prosecco and munching hors d'oeuvres, and the hostess mentioned that she didn't like having the foreigners on our square. I replied that immigration was certainly complex, but they had come to escape serious problems, and maybe we could find a way to help them feel welcome here, or contribute toward some solution. She was surprised at this perspective, and I added that there was one more foreigner living elsewhere on our square. She asked with some horror, Who?? I replied, Me. She knew I was American of course, but I had some privilege as an American married to a German, which refugees did not have. She walked away and never spoke to me again.
I sure had culture shock. Apparently, I couldn't walk down the street in Hamburg or go to the post office or a neighbor's party without embroiling myself in some sort of cross-cultural outrage. Nor could I seem to use my Harvard Law degree in a practical or sustainable manner. I tried to look at my environment from a detached perspective, as an anthropologist might: observing without judging, experiencing the culture without taking it personally. It wasn't always easy to feel good when people were trying to make me feel bad, though. Did I want my life to be one involving a constant need for emotional detachment in an environment I didn't fit into, or did I want to live a joyous and meaningful life, with ikigai to enjoy every day?
Terrible lesson: While I've always found I can meet nice people anywhere, life in Hamburg was full of bullies in daily life. Even if I could have adapted, did I want to?
Positive action: I can speak out and take action based on my principles.
An important note: the Nazi history of Germany was often present in daily life. If you drive out of Hamburg toward Frankfurt, where my husband's parents lived at the time, or toward Munich, you take the A7 north-south expressway (yes, this is part of the Autobahn, which is the federal highway system). An hour outside of Hamburg, you pass Bergen-Belsen death camp, where Anne Frank and up to 100,000 others were murdered by Germans during World War II. When the British liberated the camp in 1945, they found 10,000 unburied corpses. Click for this Time Magazine account and graphic photos taken in 1945; discretion advised.
Almost every night on television, you could find a documentary about some aspect of the Nazi era. For example, I watched a fascinating documentary where former SS officers were interviewed. One was broken by regret over the unconscionable acts of murder he had committed against Jews and others. Another seemed to be an unrepentant sociopath.
I had studied European History including the Holocaust as an undergrad at Harvard College, and was impressed on the one hand that many Germans learned about and acknowledged details of their recent Nazi history, in contrast to how so many people in the US did not learn about or acknowledge details of our slavery era. On the other hand, having developed a guilty conscience, Germany didn't seem to know what to do with it, and inward anger continued to turn outward.
You can see why I needed a vacation.
Vacation: Venice
Amidst this daily turmoil, my husband and I received an invitation to a masked ball in Venice. It was being held by the brother of a friend of my husband's. I wanted to go! My husband didn't. He had become more and more reluctant to leave the house except to go to work, and we had missed many events large and small, including my 5th-year Harvard College reunion and the wedding of a college friend of mine. I had to accept that my husband's illness wasn't something I could help by staying home with him, and he wouldn't accept medical help for his symptoms which included paranoia, mood swings, and auditory hallucinations.
So I went alone. And Venice changed my life. First, though, I had to find a costume. The theme of the ball was "16th or17th Century European or Arabian." I went to the consignment shop I had found in Hamburg where I and other petites in the non-petite-friendly city (and country) could find petite clothing. In fact, I had what today we would call a micro business, buying new small-sized clothing in the US, and selling it to the woman who owned this shop, for her to resell. Prices for US designer clothing were high in Germany, and there was demand, so it was a nice little supplement to the $8.59/hour I made as a lawyer (just writing "the $8.59/hour I made as a lawyer" seems ridiculous). Plus, it was fun to walk into an establishment in Germany where the owner was happy to see me, instead of where the staff found some reason to shout at me. At the shop, I found an exquisitely embroidered Yves St. Laurent ensemble that was perfect, as the Algerian-born French designer was so deeply inspired by Morocco. The outfit consisted of black-and-gold flowing trousers and bustier, with a little salmon-and-gold jacket. Sadly, I no longer have the outfit, or photos, but I still have the handmade gold mask I bought in Venice to go with the outfit, and this takes us into how Venice saved my life.
I flew from Hamburg to Venice, a 1 hour and 45 minute flight, and took a water taxi into the city from the airport. This was my first time in Venice -- I've been back once so far -- and I was instantly enchanted by this magical aquatic and artistic improbability of a place, so full of not only the beauty and history that we think of, but also full of kindness, gentleness, and a live-and-let-live attitude. It was also striking to me that while Venice was quite frankly filthy and crumbling, it was also noble and beautiful. Most local people were not rich, but they were warm and kind. By contrast, Hamburg was sparkling clean and pristine, a wealthy city, and overall I found the people cold and mean and unwilling to consider any way but theirs. Venice awakened me to the realization that there were other ways to live besides the dark unhappy way I had been living in Hamburg.
For example, after my fabulous boat ride into Venice, I made my way to my hotel, a modest and charmingly old-fashioned little spot on the Dorsoduro. From there, I set out to find the gold mask I wanted to go with my outfit for the masked ball the next day. On the way, I stopped at a drugstore to buy a hair band. (Do you notice too that you either have half a dozen or none in your bag at any given time?) The cashier was smiling and friendly, and wrapped up my $0.75 hair band in a cute little piece of wrapping paper, and tied it with a ribbon! Adorable! I thought: Wow, she knows I'm a tourist, and wants to welcome me, and so has turned my purchase into a special gift!
Then I saw a chocolate and pastry shop nearby, and popped in of course; usually such a shop is my first stop on any trip! I loved browsing the chocolates and confections and beautiful tins, and made a selection of a few bonbons and a pastry or two. The woman behind the counter was cheerful and delightful, and she wrapped up my items with wrapping paper and ribbon! Wow, I thought, she knows I'm a tourist and is giving me the special gift treatment too!
I couldn't resist a pair of shoes on sale at another shop -- why resist Italian fashion? Even though my Italian is rather terrible and was even worse back then as my brain was full of German (and French), I could always say my shoe size in many languages, including trentasette in Italian, which means 37 and translates to a size 6 1/2 or 7 shoe in the US! In any case, you won't be surprised to hear at this point that the store worker was very friendly, or that she wrapped my purchase in wrapping paper with a ribbon!
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| Made in Venice: I still have the beautiful handcrafted gold-leaf mask I wore to a masquerade ball in Venice, Italy, on the trip that changed my life. |
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| Was it time to remove the mask of pretense that I would have a successful law career or happy life in Hamburg? |
The wonderful people at the mask shop performed the same wrapping artistry, after helping me choose just the simple yet elegant gold mask I envisioned to go with my elaborate gold-brocaded YSL Moroccan-style outfit for the Arab-Europe-themed ball! Formed of paper mache, covered in gold leaf, and tied with a black silk ribbon, all fashioned by hand, the mask for me was an unveiling of happiness.
Not only were artisans and shop-workers kind, warm, and generous, so were people on the streets and along the canals. Museum guards didn't cast strict glances as in Germany; they smiled and chatted, or even yawned good-naturedly and turned away to relax in a chair, while I perused a Tintoretto or a Titian in peace! While crossing a piazza on my way back to the hotel, I noticed a nun coming toward me. She looked me in the eye and smiled a sweet smile as we passed, as strangers never did in Hamburg, and although I'm not a Catholic, it was as if the radiance of Heaven and Earth shined upon me. I knew it was time to change my life.
I had a marvelous time at the ball, held in a 17th century palace, arrived at by boat, naturally! How I wish I had the photos; then again, Venice is a mysterious place as you know if you have visited too, and there's nothing wrong with leaving some mystery in your mind about the beautiful setting and lovely music and costumes at the ball. After this short but significant 3-day trip, I returned to Hamburg, for the time being.
An irony: Hamburg was sometimes called the Venice of the north, but I found no comparison, literally or figuratively. Hamburg is admittedly a very pretty city, full of clean streets and small canals. You drive everywhere in Hamburg, or walk some places, or you could ride a bike or take the subway or bus. In Venice, built on 118 islands, the roads are water, the water is the road. There are no cars on the Grand Canal! In Venice, you are always on water or over water or near water or walking along water or thinking about water, or turning a funny corner and coming upon a little bridge over water. Public transportation is a boat, not a bus. And the wrapping paper and ribbons and smiles! Venice is called "La Serenissima," and gave me a serene feeling indeed, and a feeling of renewed hope!
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| As newlyweds. |
Unfortunately, even worse than disasters at work, and disasters I encountered in daily life in Hamburg, were disasters at home. That incredibly kind person who was my husband had seemingly gradually and then rapidly exhibited schizophrenic behaviors, and he refused help. The circumstances of our marriage had deteriorated over the years due to these behaviors. I kept trying to save him, but have you ever tried saving someone who didn't want saving? My mother, family, friends, and boss in whom I confided all advised me to save myself before it was too late. My mother visited me in Hamburg, and I was grateful that she believed in me no matter what. I talked with my husband's parents, wonderful people, who were also alarmed by their son's condition but were powerless to help, and who were afraid that if I took him back to America I would have him committed, which they didn't want. My family loved my husband too, and they also loved me, and wanted to see me exit a dark situation in which my husband wasn't accepting treatment and continued to act in unpredictable ways, and I had no support system.
I found it immensely difficult to let go, yet there was nothing left to hold onto. Rebuilding my own life was a process, starting with returning to Chicago, although I didn't file for divorce until another year had passed. I kept hoping that my husband would get better, and kept looking for ways for that to happen, but he didn't, and the situation became ever more horrible.
It was time to leave Hamburg, for good, I sensed. What would happen to my husband? Would he join me in the US, as I still told myself he might? We even talked about moving to Paris, because I was happy there as an exchange student, but did that really make sense at this time? Would my personal depression lift, as Venice had shown me it could, or would it deepen? Career was not foremost on my mind, but I thought I had better find a way to earn a living. Would my disastrous law career continue to be disastrous at the next destination? I think you know the answer, and I think you will see it is worse than you think. For now: viva Italia, and here's to taking action.
To be continued...!
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