Two Friends: An Israeli and an Iranian
Back then, we had no idea our parents’ origins would bring us back together with mutual support and solidarity
It was the early ‘90s and, ready to take on my final two years of school, I was starting over in a new class and a new year group. Now 16, I felt I’d finally accomplished a sense of confidence in myself that had taken years to reach.
As an all-too-driven and bright young thing, at the age of ten I’d been sent to secondary school a year early. To put this move into perspective, let me explain: after living in ex-pat communities in a number of countries, and attending a total of six different primary schools, most of which were miniscule, I went from a village school of 30 pupils to the nearby secondary of 1500. A big culture shock ensued.
In addition to the size-induced shock, all of my schools up to this point had some diversity. Now I was in a school made up of almost entirely white lower to lower-middle class kids of Anglo-Saxon origin.
There was a handful of Pakistani kids and one black Jamaican boy who stood out because of their colour. That was it. And then, hiding in amongst the white-skinned people were a tiny number of kids with foreign parents. Among those were two Iranian sisters, and two sisters with a Jewish…
