Letters from Kantstraße 104a
The
Pension Kant at Kantstraße 104a in West-Berlin provided accommodation for Tamil refugees from around 1980 to 1989. Spread over two floors, about 60 people lived there for varying lengths of time. Women came by means of traffickers whose original destination was Italy. Men from politically radicalized parties came, nationalists met internationalists, bringing political tensions with them to the Pension Kant. Some stayed for one night without applying for asylum, and some for several days, weeks or months before continuing their journey to further west in Germany, England, France or even Canada. For others, it was the start of their life in Berlin. Some found allies in the lively political scene of West Berlin. They worked delivering newspapers, they cleaned in restaurants, and they even hosted parties together. They would also follow the developing war in Sri Lanka all the while living as an exile in Berlin and receiving letters with news of the deaths of their relatives. Marriages were contracted here, families were established and children born.
The film
இனிவந்தென்னவராமல்என்ன [Does it matter if I come or go] – Letters from Kantstraße 104a is dedicated to asking which memories remain in a temporary space like an asylum shelter when people have long ceased to live there. Which traces are inscribed in the building and refer to life and living in the interstice of flight? What is the basis for remembering when, for example, letters have long since ceased to exist because they were lost during the war years?
The screening in the presence of German-Tamil filmmaker, curator and cultural scholar Anujah Fernando will be followed by a conversation between her and independent writer and policy analyst Amita Arudpragasam on questions of belonging, migration, home and the liminal spaces between.
இனிவந்தென்னவராமல்என்ன [Does it matter now if I come or go] – Letters from Kantstraße 104a
German, Tamil with English UT, Germany 2023, 25 min.
https://liminal-spaces.net/
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