I live in the Middle East.

To be more precise – I live in Jerusalem, Israel; I live in the western, Jewish part of the city, but my neighbourhood is formally in the occupied territories, and it borders an Arabic village, which is actually also a neighbourhood of Jerusalem, but the City Hall never bothered to build there basic things such as a post office or a bank or a supermarket.

That's what living here is like – everything is complicated. Everything here is a conflict.
When my mother tells me that she doesn't want me to ride busses because it's dangerous I tell her that it's ridiculous, but on the bus I find myself looking for suspicious characters. I go out with my friends to sit in a café, but we choose places that are smaller and less crowded, and that have a doorman checking people's bags (most places have a doorman nowadays). I want to leave this country, get the hell out of this god-forsaken place, but when I'm abroad I get too damn homesick, and I feel that it's wrong to be away when everything is so screwed-up back home. I love this land, but I hate this country. I think that Israel is doing a great injustice to the Palestinians and that we should get out of the occupied territories, but I also know that the terrorist organizations on the other side are bloody fundamentalists that will stop at nothing. I'm pessimistic and optimistic at the same time.
Nothing here is simple, nothing is black-or-white. Welcome to the Middle East, 2003.