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Today, like millions of people in the world, I walked to defend our democracies' values. I took the streets in Périgueux having decorated my bag with the words "Je Suis Charlie" especially for the occasion. This walk meant so many different things to me. People walked to honour the memory of the 17 victims of different terrorist attacks, to show the world they care, to defend freedom of speech, freedom of thought, freedom of cult, people stood together as one in Paris and several other cities in France and the world. Today millions of people were Charlie. As well as regular citizens, 50 country representatives joined the French president, François Hollande, in Paris to show their support to France. Among them were representatives of Greece, Israel, Algeria, Turkey, Egypt, Palestine, the Emirates, all of which walked arm in arm in the name of Freedom of speech. All day in the press I heard no mention of the 12 Palestinian journalists who died in the last 4 weeks in ...

When talking about homophobia and horrible countries that pass anti-gay laws we often think about Putin's Russia, Uganda, Mugabe, and such. These places are more or less far and their society are perceived as traditional, old fashion, nothing like our Western society that is so amazing. Yet we needn't look so far from home... We forget homophobia is on the rise everywhere, even in Europe. I feel awful whenever I tell my girlfriend I can't hold her hand when we're walking in the centre of Brussels, the capital of Europe. She doesn't hold it against me but I get angry at our society where I can't feel safe because of who I love. A week after Kansas almost did the same but gave up at the last minute, Arizona passed a bill that would allow businesses to refuse to serve or give medical treatment to gays on religious grounds . First off if you want to get biblical, according to the scriptures, you should hate the sin, not the sinner (Matthew 5:43-44, 6:14-15, ...

"What is your name?" is always the first question I get when an official opens my passport in Israel, looking at me with this incredulous look on their face, eyebrows raised, waiting for my confirmation that my name is Surya which to them, pronounced the way my parents call me, sounds like the word for Syria in both Arabic and Hebrew. (What it really is, or the way my parents intended it anyway, is the sun ) Today I also learnt from someone that apparently, I look like what could be interpreted by many Israelis as a left-wing extremist student come to do activism in the country. And I certainly don't look like the typical intern that would walk into the office, which is a good thing. I do agree, I don't like looking like the norm, I like looking like what I want to look like. Anyway, I was in no way offended by this, I found it rather amusing and very insightful. I was told this, and it was later confirmed to me by someone else, as I said I was always detained at...

Women of Israel... If you know them personally and have even the slightest relationship with them, they are truly awesome, the nation of Jewish mums. They will make sure you're fine all the time, worry for you ten times more than you if you have the slightest problem, they would send you to the doctor and force you to stay in bed if you coughed just once. But. If you encounter them at work when they have to provide a service for you, forget it, you instantly become the most annoying creature on the planet. It starts at the airport ID check when you arrive in Tel Aviv. If you are a woman (yes because I've never experienced any of these things as a man, I can't speak from that point of view, sorry) and you have an option, try to choose a man, they'll be nicer to you. The last time a guy sent me to the "waiting room" he apologised. But the women, they hate you, you're here to have some fun aren't you? Well I hate you, I'm not going to s...

For a little while now I have been struggling to find a subject to write about but tonight I have found something that really affects me. You might have seen KONY 2012 posters, people wearing tshirts with the same slogan or even heard about a man named Joseph Kony and wondered what it was or who he is. I urge my readers to support the KONY 2012 campaign and to raise awareness to stop the criminal that Joseph Kony is. For almost three decades Kony has been abducting children from their homes to turn them into soldiers or sex slaves. Kony is the founder and leader of the Lord's Resistance Army which fights for a theocratic governments based on the bible laws and while it started in Uganda, the LRA has now spread to other African countries. An estimated 66,000 children are forced to fight for them. These children are forced to mutilate others, to kill their own parents and other terrible things. Last year, Obama sent 100 advisers to help the Ugandan Army catch this man but t...

Je suis peine. Combien de personnes auront partagé ce texte de Florian Henin sur les réseaux sociaux ? Combien de personnes se sont dit « bien dit ! » ? Florian Henin qui fait des amalgames et qui n’a sûrement pas entendu parler de cet Anversois (blanc) qui a tué une jeune nounou (noire) et ce bébé de deux ans à peine dans la rue. Il n’est sûrement jamais allé à Jérusalem dans le quartier Orthodoxe o ù les enfants jettent des pierres sur les passant seraient-ils un tant soit peu découverts et s’en donnent à cœur joie et à Hébron ce ne sont pas les touristes qui sont visés mais les Palestiniens (Arabes et sans doute Musulmans). Tu te souviens l’été passé, il y a eu des émeutes en Grande-Bretagne. Sur les vidéos, on pouvait voir des blancs (athées ?)voler un noir, blessé, gisant au sol, en prétendant l’aider. Dans mon quartier de Preston, il y a des Pakistanais (Musulmans) et des blancs (athées). Quand les blancs arrivent, je te promets, tu...

Before leaving Tel Aviv for Jerusalem, I went to Jaffa. I didn't spend too much time there as everything was closed, I think it was Shabbat and I was leaving first thing the next morning to Jerusalem, but I still got to see many beautiful things that made me want to go back. And I did later during my trip. I must say I really fell in love with Jaffa. When I went back there I stayed at the Old Jaffa Hostel which was great, I enjoyed their rooftop lounge with the open air kitchen, it is a really nice place. Right across my hostel was the nicest little shop,  Hasadna , where I bought many things. They do a lot of art objects with recycled materials, it's very interesting. A little further in the street, I discovered a very good restaurant where, for some strange reason, the waitress offered me a home made cookie and home made iced tea and I know I was the only customer to get that treatment. Puaa it was called, they have a french and english menu but I took the Hebre...

Last night Steve Jobs died but I couldn't care less so instead I'll write about something else. Last week King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia announced women will have a right to vote in the 2015 local elections (not the elections that were running this week as this would be too big a shock and way too sudden, you gotta give it time so people can get used to the idea). I read the news on the BBC on Tuesday last week and the article was just very dull and reporting facts and that's probably how the news should be reported but I read this and my mind went "wait, this is really funny in a way, they fail to mention such and such". Then I went home in Belgium and bought the weekly " Le Canard Enchaîné " which expressed my point of view in a way I couldn't have formulated better myself. Saudi Arabia is supposedly run according to the Sharia Laws but I find it a bit hypocritical to say that since it is the only country in the World where women don't hav...

Although I am far from home and on holidays, I still read the news (if I didn't I would have to reconsider my choice of studies) Yesterday in the english version of Haaretz, they were talking about the rights on Enyd Blyton's "The Famous Five" and "The Secret Seven" that are being translated in Hebrew at the moment and to be published soon in Israel although another publisher has been publishing a translated version for many years without the rights. Fine, nothing interesting much until the end of the article when I read the books written for children, are considered sexist, racist and so on and that they were banned from the radio in England on grounds of lack of artistic talent or something, basically hey were unworthy of being read on the BBC. The books are being rerwritten for publication in the United Kingdom to reach today's political correctness standards. And there we reach the whole debate we had with "TinTin in Congo" in Belgium a...

In the UK, the Equal Pay Act was introduced in 1970. Forty years later, survey shows full-time working women are still paid 16.4% less than men. That means, in term of proportions and comparison, women stop being paid from November 2nd while men are paid all year 'round. This is only for the UK but I am sure it is pretty much the same everywhere in the world. Surely you would think, people think it is outrageous, yet I don't think many people will sign the petition to try and change things (I suggest you sign it -  here  - not to be part of the latter category) because they just can't be bothered eventhough it took me like 27 seconds and a click. People cannot spend 27 seconds and a click to try and change their situation, that is way too much! But tonight they'll be watching Friends on tv, yeah that is no waste of time. But apathetic people are not the only ones who won't sign the petition. All over the world, there are still many people defending their "...