"I was scared for my children, too. I don’t have a lot but one was just born around the time the Wall came down, a daughter. And my ex-wife also brought her child. True, her child wasn’t black but white. But people always looked [as if to say]: 'Oh, that woman is with a n*'."
Ibraimo Alberto was born in Mozambique. When Mozambique gained independence, then 18-year-old Alberto, a convinced socialist, applied to enter the GDR to study sport. In the event, he was employed as a "contract worker" in a meat combine. The GDR state kept back some of his pay, informing him he would receive it on his return to Mozambique. After work, Ibraimo Alberto went boxing and became a successful amateur boxer. In 1990, the workers from Mozambique were sent home but Ibraimo Alberto stayed in Germany. He lived with his family in Schwedt, East Germany, trained to become a social worker and gained a position with the council as a specialist for the integration of foreigners. After several severe, violent racist attacks, he and his family moved to Karlsruhe. He now lives in Berlin where he is a social worker for refugees and a boxing trainer for young people. He never received his outstanding wages.
Reading recommendation: Ibraimo Alberto mit Daniel Bachmann: Ich wollte leben wie die Götter. Was in Deutschland aus meinen afrikanischen Träumen wurde, Köln 2014
Mixed feelings after the fall of the Wall
Mixed feelings after the fall of the Wall
Archive of escapes https://archivderflucht.hkw.de/ibraimo-alberto/
Self-will in the sister country https://bruderland.de/protagonists/ibraimo-alberto/