The Refugee Who Fell in Love With His Teacher
Like many young couples in love in Germany, Julia Pichl and Javad Ganjkhanloo post pictures of themselves on Facebook, go on dates to the park, and dream of moving into a small apartment together. Unlike other couples, however, they face an uncertain future that rests on a slow-moving bureaucracy and fluctuating public opinion. Pichl is German, but Ganjkhanloo is Iranian—one of an estimated 890,000 asylum-seekers who arrived in Germany in 2015.
An outspoken atheist, Ganjkhanloo said he was subjected to lashings and the threat of imprisonment after the Iranian government seized his house and belongings. He has waited for almost a year for an interview to determine whether he can stay in Germany permanently. Until the German government approves his asylum status, he is in limbo, unable to leave and unable to stay as the government relocates him to various refugee camps around the country.
The number of people seeking asylum in Germany dropped dramatically last year, when public discontent prompted German Chancellor Angela Merkel to tighten borders. According to a 2016 Pew Research Center poll, two-thirds of Germans disapproved of how the EU was handling the refugee situation. A rising right-wing, anti-immigration party, the AfD (Alternative for Germany), has vocalized a simmering animosity toward refugees. Attacks by individual asylum-seekers, including one at a Berlin Christmas market that killed 12 people, has only increased the friction.
Aided by a translator, I spoke with Pichl and Ganjkhanloo separately about their experiences as an intercultural couple in a country rife with political and cultural tensions, one still struggling to come to grips with its new inhabitants. For the moment, this
