Basheer Abu-Eid

My childhood memories are set in a small town in the outskirts of Bethlehem, serenely situated on a hill amid olive groves. Everything surrounding me had a story of its own: the birthplace of Christ barely two miles away, the church of St. Nicholas with its catacombs and Byzantine mosaics, even the olive trees which our elders called Roman trees. All betrayed an enchanting past worth exploring. The bells from the town's belfries echoed far enough to reach the nearby Palestinian refugee camps and Jewish settlements.

An Arab by ethnicity, a Palestinian by nationality and an Orthodox Christian by faith, I have grown up on the crossroad of civilizations, languages and religions.

Although I majored in civil engineering, words and history have always been what gave me wings to fly. I was able to win several writing competitions both in high school and university.

For the past ten years, I have been living with my family in Greece, something which has enriched my experience and offered me a different, perhaps closer perspective of the past.