There is one thing I have always been sure of: I never belonged to this place even if it happened to be my family’s origin. I never belonged to these people even though I am related to them by blood.

For I share absolutely nothing with them. Not my goals or my interests, not my knowledge or even the way I dress. I might be speaking their language and performing their prayers but so do tens of millions of other humans who call themselves Muslim Arabs.

Does my birthplace have an effect as huge as such? Or is it the way I was raised, so sealed off from the outside world into a better inner magical world? Or is it that all the nerdy genes from my ancestors miraculously gathered in my very DNA to set me off from the family and cause painful isolation from the rest of my so-called community?

Is it only me or are there others out there who suffer of such isolation and distinction?  Is it only me or are there others who are constantly ridiculed upon simply because it is too damn hard for people of such a closed community to understand a concept called difference.

Is it only me or are there other people who keep it all inside and practice ignorance almost every day and with every person they meet. Yet, they cry every night wishing for only one understanding person to speak to.

Or write it down in a post such as this instead.

The truth is, the process of trying to fit in has been absolutely exhausting. So much effort has to be done to fit in a community which lacks the determination and willpower to improve. A community which lacks hunger for knowledge and innovation. A community which shows off its rotted values of blind repetition and idealizing no one but the ignorant and deceivers.

Therefore, I have learned to keep my aspirations and my goals to myself. To keep my images of perfection only in my head. I have learned to work silently on my own. Because to me, sharing never meant caring but harsh ridicule and envy. I have learned to be someone else when I am around people to let the days pass. I have learned to cry only at home, alone between the walls of my room.

Even after twenty-two years on this planet, and four years in this city, it still kills me every day to see myself living in a world where I will never find home.