I'd rather not

 
Zurich, Rieterpark, June 2012

Integration has become one of these terms that are rarely questioned. Most of us think it normal that foreigners who wish to live in the country we grew up in need to adapt to "our" system. As far as I'm concerned, 'though not a foreigner in this country, I'd rather not.

As a young man I could never imagine to become a valuable member of a social system that I deemed not only unfair (it favoured the ruthless, the inconsiderate, the indecent) but totally unattractive (it rewarded the vain, the egomaniacs, the spiritually empty).

The heroes of my youth were sportsmen, rock musicians, underground poets, the ones that I then perceived as outsiders. I never imagined them to become valued members of society ... but they did and nowadays hold opinions about pretty much everything that prevents us from having a life of our own.

Societal pressure was strong and not without promise. Why I did not succumb to it like most of the sportsmen, rock musicians, and underground poets of my youth. I guess it's to do with personality.

Personality is what we come to life with. It is not something we choose and thus not something we can be proud of. What makes us the ones we are we are not responsible for. Nevertheless, we do have the ability to go along with it or to fight it.

Most people, it seems to me, do not indulge in such ponderings. I do not have the foggiest idea why I do so but I'm very much in tune with it.