Election Day

Oh. My. G-d.

I just realized that my life is “The Little Mermaid.”

Basically I spent a long time thinking about how great it must be to live in this other place, and in return for finally getting the chance to live there I had to give up my voice. Okay, not literally, cos I can still speak English just fine, but you get my point…




Henyways, today is election day here ba’aretz, and thus we do not have class. What a fucking amazing country this is—no class on election day? I mean, heck, that’s pretty awesome. What can I do with a whole day to myself? I could go to Tel Aviv today, go to the beach…but I hate Tel Aviv, and I hate the beach. But the idea that I CAN is awesome. “Yes we can!”

So far my election day vacay has consisted of sleeping in, then watching “Billy Elliot.”

I feel like I should be out doing something patriotic and celebrating democracy in the Middle East…but I actually can’t help feeling a bit bitter. Immigrants can’t vote unless they’ve been on the register at the Ministry of Interior for at least three months, and I’ve only been registered for a couple weeks (since I got my ID card).

And at first this totally didn’t bother me, and I figured Israel was still being very generous. But this weekend I just got so frustrated. I met this Canadian girl who is technically an Israeli citizen. Her grandparents or something were Israeli, and despite the fact that her parents and she have never actually lived in Israel, this girl is an Israeli citizen. She’s in Israel for the semester to study abroad but is planning to return to Canada and live her life there after the program is over. She does not have an obligation to the Israeli army.

And she gets to vote.

This *tourist* (yes, I call her a tourist even though she’s a citizen because she doesn’t plan to actually live here) gets to pick the government that will be leading the country well after she’s already run back home to Canada in June, whereas I don’t get to pick the government that will be leading the army that I’LL be serving in for two years in the not so distant future.

How the fuck is that fair?

I’m not saying that this means that I, too, deserve to vote. I actually think neither of us deserves to vote, since neither of us has been here for very long. But I’m still pissed off.

Actually, I take that back: I think I do fucking deserve to vote. If I’m enough of a citizen that the army tells me that I have to do two years of obligatory service, then I’m enough of a citizen to vote in the fucking elections.

Oh well….just another thing I’ll have to take care of when I’m Prime Minister. Well, that and ordering an air strike on the kibbutz laundry room.

Happy fucking election day, Israel.

EDIT: Yigal Amir can vote. And I can't.