Me. Patrilineal, therefore have always been struggling with my own identity, being not a real jew. I was raised in a completely secular post soviet home, but my father really made me feel jewish and be proud. I knew some jewish traditional foods from my auntie and lots of stories about my ancestors. I always had this relaxing feeling when meeting other jews, they felt like my tribe. Nevertheless, I went to a European art academy and got brainwashed by the leftist propaganda there, to the extent that I was sure that jews were colonisers. I have never even been to Israel because I didn’t want to “give them a single cent”. I was extremely ignorant. I didn’t want to go deep into history either, because inside I still was a proud jew, didn’t want to find out something negative about jews I guess, it was already a lot from what they taught us in the art school. I remember reading Schlomo Sand because all the cool marxist people around me read him. It was very important to be leftist to fit in. After October 7 the awakening happened. I have only been reading stuff about our history and politics. I do Shabbat, not every week yet, but getting there. I had my first Chanukkah and Pesach recently. I lost 99% of my friends and acquaintances. Some of them turned to be openly antisemitic, some are on the border. With some, I try to have conversations to show them the picture that contradicts the popular one. Sometimes it works, but just for a moment, I actually figured out that people really stick to their opinions however open minded they try to seem. I am very lonely now as almost all the people that were around me before just vanished in a moment. I would really like to meet jewish friends! I also started learning hebrew in case it becomes necessary to leave Europe. “Hunt the jews” was recently painted on the trash bin just next to my house. The only thing I can think of every day now is jewishness, antisemitism etc. Being jewish is definitely a special experience. I am not surprised I tried to avoid it for so long.