Der Goetheplatz

written by Larissa Cammarata

Faizeh is a mother of three, married, and a trained medical professional. She has been living in Mainz for five years. I got in touch with her through the sports and cultural association Arc-en-Ciel e. V. Her narratives provide a glimpse into her everyday life. During the interview and a shared walk, it becomes evident that her movement in the urban space of Mainz and her perception of space are shaped by her parenthood. In this section, we can learn more about Mainz from the perspective of a “Mama Superstar”.

The inspiration for the article title is the book “Mama Superstar. Eleven Portraits of Courage, Unconditional Love, and Cultural Diversity.” A parallel between the work of “My Migrant Mama” and this one is to focus on migrant parents.

In the Neustadt district lies the Goetheplatz, surrounded by a kindergarten, rows of houses, places of worship, and a police station. This public space is marked as “child-friendly,” as indicated by the sign “Platz der Kinderrechte” (Place of Children’s Rights). Playgrounds, climbing frames, the skate and water park, as well as green spaces, offer a variety of leisure activities.

Faizeh’s favorite place in Mainz is the Goethepark. She laughs as she admits that she prefers to spend time at a playground, saying, “I feel like (laughs) here, you can also relax [at the playground]. I sit and have a coffee.” Perhaps Faizeh chuckled because her favorite place is a “playground” where she herself does not play, but her children do while she relaxes. Her favorite place is more a reflection of how intertwined her leisure and family time are.

Adjacent to the park is the Sen-Kiosk, which Faizeh considers part of a visit to the Goethepark. “I love their coffee, I don’t know if it’s really good coffee or not,” she says. She likes to order a latte there. Like a café, the kiosk invites you to linger, with a small outdoor area, tables, and chairs. It becomes apparent that when Faizeh talks about her favorite place, she inevitably also thinks of her favorite coffee and associates it with this place. Thus, these are not just empty descriptions of places, but actions that fill the space and define the Goetheplatz for Faizeh.

Today, she lives in the Mainz-Lerchenberg district and drives 30 minutes to return to the Goethepark. Accompanied by her three children and sometimes two other mothers with their children. “We go to this playground as a group,” she says. Visiting Goetheplatz provides a change in their daily routine: “A new place for the children, a new offering for them,” where they have space to make experiences with friends and be together.

She emphasizes the children’s leisure activities, and at the same time, she leads the community of parents, mostly mothers. Her parenthood is an anchor point for her acquaintances because through her children’s social network, she forms friendships in Mainz. “Since the children, friendships are different too. My friends are now the mothers of the children from school or neighbors.” This reveals the intertwining of parenthood in many aspects of her everyday life; both in terms of her leisure activities and who she spends time with.

In general, Faizeh talks about contrasting everyday worlds before and after parenthood. Places are perceived and visited differently as a mother or parent, she emphasizes.

Here is Faizeh’s impression of places in Mainz, illustrating why going out requires planning:

“Here, there are places either for children or for adults, and I always hope that there is a place where children can do what they want, play and such, and then for the parents as well. Where one can sit and relax or something.” 

When asked how she would change the city and if she lacks places in it, she responded in line with this logic. She misses spaces suitable for each age group of her children, aside from their club memberships. Additionally, she often does not know where to take her children in bad weather or during winter. Under these weather conditions, she does not even visit the Goethepark. Generally, it is difficult to find places where parents and children can enjoy their leisure time simultaneously. Faizeh always considers the compatibility of her family and checks in advance whether she can satisfy the needs of her three children, her husband, and herself before going out. From leisure activities to everyday tasks such as shopping and caregiving, Faizeh’s life is influenced by her parenthood.

As another part of her preparation, she mentioned that she rarely leaves the apartment with a light backpack; the diaper changing supplies for her children, for example, must not be forgotten. Because even if there are diaper changing rooms in the city, diaper changing supplies are not always freely available, such as at the Goetheplatz. During her pregnancy, she also noticed how few nursing rooms there are in Mainz, compared to her experience in Poland. Faizeh and her family lived in Poland for several years before moving to Mainz. The lack of diaper changing and nursing rooms surprises her even more in places visited by parents and children. As Faizeh previously described her everyday reality, a spatial separation of child and parent is unlikely. Failure to consider this in urban planning thus complicates casual movement in the city. She explains the consequences.

A sports club, of which one of her children is a member, has a diaper changing and nursing room, while another does not. In the negative case, this presents a challenge, namely that she cannot breastfeed and/or change the accompanying sibling. Apart from her children’s leisure activities, shopping at the drugstore is also on her list, where the same differences can be observed. Some DM stores offer diaper changing rooms including supplies. Rossmann, on the other hand, does not, and even shopping with a stroller is critically observed by employees. There, she experienced being accused of theft because she went shopping with a stroller and took out the goods from it to pay, instead of using a basket or shopping cart. In addition to the cashier’s mistrust, she also refused to speak English, depriving Faizeh of the opportunity to clarify the misunderstanding. Pre-purchased products from another store were already in the stroller. At this point, another cashier intervened and spoke with Faizeh.

The incident illustrates that spaces are carriers of certain actions and of certain rules of conduct, which can, however, be opaque. Rules of conduct may be incompatible with family life. Assuming all customers have this knowledge can lead to a general suspicion of theft in case of ignorance and may seek to legitimize racial profiling. Finally, it becomes clear that not only commercial places, but also government institutions, forget about the presence of children in urban planning. Faizeh also mentions that there are no diaper changing or nursing rooms at the immigration office, although the stay there is associated with long waiting times. Through all her narratives, a theme emerges. 

For Faizeh personally, the Goetheplatz is ultimately a place she feels connected to:

“Do you know why? That’s the first place here, yes, sometimes you have this memory, when I came to Germany, I was pregnant with my daughter, and I needed time to walk, and I walked to this playground [laughs]. After that, I developed a relationship with this place, I feel like I go there to relax and take my children with me. My children also like this place, really.”

During a walk with Faizeh at the Goetheplatz, she points to the benches at the back near the kiosk, where she used to go to think when she still lived in the Neustadt. A place she would visit when everything became too much for her. During her pregnancy, she perceived emotions more intensely, including her fear and worries because she wears a headscarf, she recalled. This is part of a reality of parents, beyond the question of family compatibility. A reality in which Islamophobia and racism are considered and feared; when they move, when they visit places, when they shop, when they raise their children. When they live in Mainz.

Author’s note: In memory of Marwa El-Sherbini.

More places of Faizeh can be found in the entries “Workplaces of Reading and Learning” and “Do you speak English?”

Faizeh ist dreifache Mutter, verheiratet und studierte Medizinerin. Sie lebt seit fünf Jahren in Mainz. Den Kontakt zu ihr habe ich über den Sport- und Kulturverein Arc-en-Ciel e. V. erhalten. Ihre Erzählungen geben Gelegenheit, spezifisch in ihren Alltag zu blicken. Während des Interviews und einem gemeinsamen Spaziergang wird ersichtlich, dass ihre Bewegung im Mainzer Stadtraum und Raumwahrnehmung von ihrer Elternschaft geprägt ist. In diesem Reiter können wir mehr aus der Perspektive einer „Mama Superstar“ über Mainz erfahren und lernen.

Inspiration für den Beitragstitel ist das Buch „Mama Superstar. Elf Porträts über Mut, bedingungslose Liebe und kulturelle Vielfalt“. Eine Parallele der Arbeit von „My Migrant Mama“ und dieser ist, das Augenmerk auf migrantische Eltern zu lenken.