Mutfak dishes out diasporic and decolonial perspectives on food, family and fictions peppered with interviews, field recordings, sound archives and poetry. Our goal is to amplify lesser-heard voices and nurture transversal affinities across Afro-Asian diasporas.

• Crossings
• Vernissage
• Friday, 18 July 2025
• Refuge Worldwide, NM1 — Niemetzstraße 1, 12055 Berlin

Crossings gathers the diverse experiences of Berlin’s diasporic communities, exploring how belonging is shaped, questioned, negotiated and transformed across cultural, national, and affective borders. Emerging from two interdisciplinary and inter-university X-Tutorials—"Forms of Belonging: The Making and Unmaking of Transnational Identities Across Afro-Asian Diasporas in Berlin" and "Understanding the Concept of Belonging Through Cinema: Crossing the Borders of Türkiye"—this joint research project and exhibition aims to bring together communities in meaningful ways that traverse the boundaries of genres, geographies and generations.

• Performers: Asrin Mahmood, Jaymie Wei, Elena Agebo, Savannah Sipho, Julianne Chua and Anna Frehiwot Maconi
• Moderator: Anna Frehiwot Maconi
• Sound Technician: Chali

Many thanks to Megan Lindeboom and Ali Najjar for audiovisual support, photography and videography. Funded by the Humboldt-Universitäts-Gesellschaft (HUG), the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), and the State of Berlin as part of the Excellence Strategy of the Federal and State Governments by the Berlin University Alliance.

This reading was recorded at Refuge Worldwide NM1 on 18 July 2025.

With Guests: Asrin Mahmood is an undergraduate student at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin with Kurdish roots but born and raised in Germany. She approaches her research from an intersectional perspective, exploring identity, memory, and belonging. Her work reflects her journey of untangling inherited trauma and cultural displacement through both personal and academic lenses.

Jaymie Wei is a Chinese American born and raised just outside Boston. She currently studies primary school education at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and has been living in Berlin for three years. She draws from personal experiences in her writing.

Elena Agebo (b. Cologne, 1997) studies American Studies at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. She writes about memory, alienation, and the quiet but persistent voices in her own head. In 2023, she won the Dortmund LesArt Prize for Young Literature.

Savannah Sipho is a Berliner Spoken Word Poetess. She has been performing for many events across Berlin including Wicked Poetry Slam, Poetry Meets, Decolonial Flânerie by Nachbarschaftsinitiative Anton-Wilhelm-Amo-Straße (NAWAS) as well as The Pinguin Bar at the 2023 Berliner Festspiele. Some of Savannah Sipho’s works have been published in Sisters and Souls 2: Inspirationen durch May Ayim. Her poem “Inspirational Ayim—Gazes that Matter” was aired on the German radio station Deutschlandfunk Nova. Identity, Black history, and the array of emotions, racism and experiences throughout her life as a Black woman in Berlin are recurring themes in her writing.