You look so beautiful when you’re angry, working class

In the summer of 2011, I arrived at Lisbon to continue my studies. It was the financial crisis. Portugal was on fire. Geração à Rasca and the Rossio encampments had happened already. I got on board with stuff like Plataforma 15 de Outubro; then the general strikes and the youth support group to the strikes, Artigo 74; all of which got intertwined with Que Se Lixe a Troika.

I remember the euphoria. 

I mean, I remember my own euphoria. I had just started learning Portuguese and I had almost no idea of Portuguese history (neither classical nor modern history); so I had no understanding of how others would be receiving it. 

I saw a lot of internationalism, I saw a lot of joy, I saw a lot anger.

In the middle of all of this, 2013 happened in Türkiye. It was the Gezi Uprising that changed the course of the country for good. It changed the left (the leading figure who came out of this process, Selahattin Demirtas, is still in jail today), it changed the government coalition (there was a coup attempt by one of the factions within the government alliance, which was then declared a terrorist group), it changed an entire generation. I went to Istanbul after the second week, and stayed for more than a week.

In both cases, I arrived a bit late to the party, one can say.

In Portugal, I was barely organized. In Türkiye, I wasn’t organized at all.

I remember my euphoria and fascination. I remember seeing classmates from primary school for the first time since years, helping out with the medical team in the Gezi park. I remember calling my own parents in Izmir and telling them “You will now leave the house, go to the square, and will stay there. Okay?” Simple words, no negotiation. I remember my father answering that they were out of town, and me answering that in that case they will have to rush more. I remember my favorite summer jacket soaked in water with teargas that the water cannons sprayed on us. I remember hiding in a barbershop at 3 am, running away from the police. My memories are all personal, or at most with friends. I remember escaping detention, when we crossed a police line pretending to be a tourist returning home. I remember my friends complaining about “losing the Class Struggle in one week”, they meant the boardgame they left in the park when the police attacked.

I remember my euphoria and fascination. I didn’t get hurt or arrested in Istanbul. But there was a plot twist. I returned to Lisbon, there was a general strike, with a demonstration ending at the parliament. Some 400-500 people marched on, went to parts of the city I have never seen (I had seen them), entered what I considered to be a highway (it wasn’t), and took the exit to the 25 April bridge, at which point the police kettled us. (This was more than an hour of marching and chanting.) I was one of 226 people arrested in the middle of the road. The police in Lisbon doesn’t have infrastructure for mass arrests, so they kept us in a backstreet for some six hours. The case was later archived by the prosecutor.

The “square movements” of 2010s, from Tahrir to New York, from Madrid to Istanbul, from Syria to Brazil, marked a generation. They changed us, and they changed our countries. For a relatively long window of time, we were one. Our movements had different starting points and different contexts, so they had different courses and radically different end points.

I had registered my take-aways in an essay in 2014, The Mayonnaise Effect: Global Inspiration from Gezi, in ROAR Magazine.

From 2022 onward, I felt another wave coming. Its initial steps came from Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Thailand, Kenya, and Serbia. In 2025, the Gen Z mobilizations became undeniable. In Indonesia, Nepal, the Philippines, Morocco, Peru, East Timor, the United States and Madagascar, millions came to the streets, faced the military, and insisted (and sometimes toppled governments). Somehow, the spirit of the times didn’t seem to reach where I was (still in Lisbon). It was confusing.

Then came the second half of 2026, and Europe finally woke up. Albania, France, Spain, Italy, Greece and Portugal are up. I am in Portugal. So I am also up.

I feel the euphoria.

I am also forty years old now. I see some of the people from the 2010s round in the encampment in Lisbon, they are few. They put themselves in a “supporting” role, which they call solidarity. That language is foreign to me. I am fascinated. I am trying to carry on the lessons, concretely, in praxis. In 2010s, Portugal had done quite well in comparison to the rest of the experiments. I feel like that’s also the case now.

The people I am organizing with are not of my generation (well, mostly). The people I am fighting with are not of my generation. I have a large affinity group where I am the oldest person. I am fascinated by them.

I can relate to the euphoria and to the fascination. But I am also feeling a bit rusty.

But something has changed. I am organized.

My emotions are therefore completely different. I am vivacious. I am fascinated, agitated, inspired. I am also calm, strategic, grounded. I can be all of these things because I can rely on a bunch of comrades who take up tasks and who make sure that I remain useful.

I can see how, if I were not organized, this whole thing could look like a second edition of the same thing of years ago, how I could get nostalgic (and therefore irrelevant for praxis). I am grateful that I am having this experience with a completely different perspective, with a completely different contribution to the process. I am grateful to everyone who showed up. I am also grateful to specific individuals who are with me in this.

There is one wall writing that was in Istanbul in 2013, which keeps popping up in my head. “You look so beautiful when you’re angry, working class.”

We look so beautiful when we’re angry.