The experience of foreignness, the encounter with different nationalities and contradictory life concepts often triggers defense mechanisms and fear. Where boundaries replace communication, social cohesion is also at risk in Germany. The writer and publicist Zafer Senocak counters this fear with a conscious, biographical engagement with the foreign within ourselves. As the child of Turkish middle-class parents living in Germany, Senocak grows up with the languages, literatures, rituals, and stories of two countries. Neither culture offers clear identity options; the German culture keeps him as "the Turk," while the Turkish culture does not provide clarity either. Through his politically engaged mother, Senocak experiences a secular-modern intellectualism, while his father embodies a critical yet deeply spiritual Islam.