1.	My favourite thing in the world is to write while home alone. My favourite place in the world is any bed that has a lot of blankets and pillows.

2.	My second favourite thing to do is visit an art museum.

3.	My dream is to have no home, and become a nomad who writes books and directs movies while slow-traveling the world.

4.	Then again, I love architecture and interior design, and enjoy planning my dream home.

5.	I am vegetarian and an aspiring vegan. I don’t miss meat in the slightest (it actually grosses me at this point), but dairy? Ugh. Yum

6.	I think tomatoes are the devil’s fruit. It’s very hard to find a vegetarian option at a restaurant that doesn’t rely on them.

7.	I can’t eat spicy.

8.	I don’t like anything too seasoned, either. When I cook, I am sometimes asked if I forgot to add seasoning. (One time I asked a friend how come the salad she’d made tasted so good. She looked at me dead in the eye and said, “Salt. I added salt.”)

9.	I hold a multidisciplinary BA in arts and humanities from Tel-Aviv University (with majors in literature, psychoanalysis, art, and cinema) and an MA in creative writing from the University of East Anglia. I almost started a PhD in creative-critical writing, but ultimately decided against it.

10.	I am one of a set of triplets. Also, my mom and aunt are identical twins. Finally, I have an older half-brother.

11.	I don’t believe in astrology, but almost everything they say about Aquarius is true when it comes to me. My brother and sister are my polar opposites, though, so astrology was wrong about them.

12.	I am also a textbook introvert (in a family of extroverts). But there are some extroverted exceptions. It is a spectrum, after all.

13.	I am left-wing. When it comes to politics, I am a firm believer in “the personal is the political”, and that there are no exceptions: you either support equality for all, or don’t.

14.	I am left-handed. My entire family is right-handed. There may or may not be a surprising number of differences between us that make me joke I was adopted, but if they’re reading this, then… there aren’t.

15.	I like both cats and dogs, but never owned one. (Only a pet fish that died from overfeeding.)

16.	I was born Jewish, but identify as atheist. I think religion is a very comforting notion. I seek comfort as much as the next person, but can’t bring myself to believe in anything. Although I’ve always wanted to be agnostic.

17.	“What about breakfast?” “You’ve already had it.” “We’ve had one, yes. What about second breakfast?” This quote from Lord of the Rings is me every morning. I am always hungry, and need to eat six small meals a day.

18.	95% of the time I only drink water. I love the taste of coffee, but can’t remember the last year I’ve had it. Also, I hate anything sparkling.

19.	On 10 August 2003, when I was 8, I spent the night at a hospital due to severe stomach aches (and chest pain for some reason?) from drinking too much chocolate milk. Guess what I chose to drink before going to bed there.

20.	One of the things I hate the most about Israel (and there are plenty) is the fact you can’t find black sticky rice anywhere. Bubur Pulut Hitam is a delicacy, and one of the only things that fill me up.

21.	The Israeli cottage cheese, on the other hand… the number one thing I miss about Israel when I’m abroad. (Bamba is a close second.)

22.	The tips of my body are so prone to cold, that I cannot survive a winter without gloves and sleeping without socks.

23.	I can’t shave all the way through, otherwise I will get a razor burn and ingrown hair.

24.	I can’t swallow pills. My gag reflex won’t let me. On the rare occasion where I need medication, I first look for the child-friendly, liquid version.

25.	Long showers are like oxygen to me. If I need to flesh out an idea, I make a mental note to think about it in the shower, or later when I go to bed.
26.	I used to have major problems with my sleep. I was never a morning person, but now I’m not a night person, either. (Then again, there is nothing as memorable as a sleepless night.)

27.	Anything less than eight hours of sleep is torture. Nine hours are ideal.

28.	My favourite sculpture is The Dying Gaul. I want a Celtic torc like his, except with an ouroboros closure. I’ll try to remember this for the day I can afford jewellery.

29.	I am obsessed with anything Greek and Roman, and wish I could’ve lived in Athens between 479-404 B.C. Watching Antigone, Oedipus Rex, or the Oresteia at an ancient Greek theatre is on my bucket list. But I’ll settle for Ajax, Medea, the Bacchae, Lysistrata, or The Trojan Women.

30.	I also love Japan, having studied Japanese on-and-off since seventh grade. If Japan weren’t so prone to natural disasters, I might have considered moving there.

31.	My favourite movie is 2001: A Space Odyssey. I will never forget the first time I watched it. My mom asked me afterwards if I’d seen God.

32.	I also love Some Like It Hot, Carol, Gravity, The Tree of Life, Breathless, The Favourite, All About Eve, Inside Out, Wall-E, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, The Truman Show, Mean Girls, The Devil Wears Prada, Legally Blonde, The Princess Diaries, Confessions of a Shopaholic, and G.B.F. (It’s a Wonderful Life gets an honourable mention because the ending always makes me weep, but it’s also way too capitalist and Christian for my liking.)

33.	Every memory I have is accompanied by an image of where I was when it happened, even if it was just a small moment such as getting a text.

34.	My memory is 5% gossip, 5% things I learned in school, 5% song lyrics, and 85% embarrassing moments from my past.

35.	My favourite TV show is a tie between Twin Peaks and Ugly Betty. The former is a work of art. The latter, I can quote entire scenes from, and watch every year on my birthday.

36.	I also love SpongeBob, Mad Men, Sex and the City, Orange is the New Black, Veep, Black Mirror, The Good Place, The Wire, Project Runway, RuPaul’s Drag Race, Fleabag, The Prisoner, Death Note, The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, The Other Two (which shares eerie similarities with my life), and the first season of Hacks and Girls5Eva.

37.	My favourite book… tough call. None makes me laugh, enjoy, and cry as much as Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. It was the first book I read in English, at twelve years old. I just wish Rowling would have axed the epilogue. And toned down the Christianity.

38.	I also love Frankenstein, Dorian Gray, 1984, Norwegian Wood, The Fountainhead, She: A History of Adventure, Gone Girl, We Need to Talk About Kevin, and Emma.

39.	I actually blame JK Rowling for the fact I wear glasses. I read the Goblet of Fire so much in second grade (even during recess), that my eyes never recovered.

40.	I am not a fan of binge-watching. If I like a TV show, I will want to take it slow, spend time mulling over it in-between episodes, and maybe rewatch some before continuing to the next. The one exception is Fleabag. I watched both seasons in one sitting, and rewatched them several times since. (The book equivalent of that is Call Me by Your Name, which I read in one sitting.)

41.	I have been a huge Nintendo fan ever since I was five or so, and I absolutely loath them for not having released a new 2D Mario since 2012. (Nintendo, if you are reading this…)

42.	My favourite video games are Super Mario Galaxy 1&2, Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story, Super Mario Bros 3, Pokémon B/W 1&2, Pokémon S/M, Pokémon Legends: Arceus, Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze, Mario Kart 8, Super Mario Odyssey, Super Smash Bros Ultimate, and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.

43.	I used to be in the school choir before my voice changed. Now I write songs, but can’t sing them.

44.	I played the piano all through elementary school, and recently bought a keyboard with the intention of getting back into it. Sadly, Rachmaninov wasn’t as feasible as I’d hoped, nor was transcribing the notes in my head to sheet music.

45.	I wrote fanfiction of Gingi, a popular children’s book series in Israel, in elementary school, before I even knew what fanfiction was. Then I mailed seven handwritten books to the author, Galila Ron Feder Amit, and we corresponded between May 2003 and September 2004 (I was 8-9 years old). I still have all the books and letters from her.

46.	I started writing fiction in 7th grade, when I wrote short stories in English class. Novels came later, in 10th grade. I’ve always known I would be a writer, and I’ve always known I would do so in English, even though it wasn’t my first language.

47.	I’ve been writing only in cursive since middle school. My non-cursive handwriting is atrocious.

48.	I have several stories about breaking almost every finger on my right hand as a child. It started on 12 August 1999, at 4.5 years old, when I inserted my right thumb into an electric gate while it was closing. There is also that time I put on some kind of a “theatre show” in kindergarten and stood on something that might’ve been a laundry basket, fell, needed stitches on my lips, and broke the left side of my chin. To this day, it is slightly less sharp than the right, and there’s a small scar.

49.	Every year in elementary school, I tried to write and direct a play about Passover. I prepared for weeks and forced my friends to participate and create set decoration with me. It never worked out.

50.	I also forced my friends to record an acapella version of the ending symphony from Jellyfish Jam, an episode from the first season of SpongeBob, on what might’ve been an old Walkman. We tried to record it in sixth grade during recess for weeks. It never worked out. God, I was an annoying kid.

51.	I used to run away quite a lot as a child from situations I did not want to find myself in, like from summer day camp, on 28 July 2004. I will never forget a school trip in sixth grade to Jerusalem, where we had to crawl through the Siloam tunnel, a tiny and claustrophobic water tunnel, for almost an hour. When it was my turn to enter it, I said the biggest NOPE of my life, fled, traversed an Arab neighbourhood (I don’t speak Arabic) without adult supervision, and miraculously found my way back. I had a massive fear of caves as a child, with more stories like this, but I’ve outgrown it.

52.	When I was in 10th grade, I wrote and directed a music video of Maxwell’s Silver Hammer, my favourite Beatles song at the time. To this day, it makes me laugh so hard, that it brings me to tears. I think it’s the funniest and most embarrassing thing I’ve ever done (since I also played the lead role). I would upload it to YouTube in a heartbeat, if I had the permission of everyone involved.

53.	I know I sound like one of those unruly, artistic types, but I am actually very organised. I like tidying up anything messy, even if it’s not mine. It’s quite therapeutic for me, to take something chaotic and make it neat. I also like doing laundry… taking something dirty and making it clean… I sound like a housewife.

54.	I am very particular about recycling (and reducing and reusing), much to the dismay of my family and friends, who aren’t. I have an old tote bag that says “RECYCLE OR DIE”. It was a good present.

55.	I almost always take a bag with me when I go out, because I like to be equipped, but mostly because seeing people with phones in their pockets makes my eyes bleed. So apart from phone, wallet, and keys, I might carry water, tissues, masks, an umbrella, a cleaning cloth for my glasses (can’t live without those!), food and band aids… I’m the male version of that person who always carries tampons with them.

56.	My first time leaving home was to live alone abroad for my MA. I’ll never forget the moment I waved goodbye to my family and realised I was, for the first time in my life, on my own. It felt good. Then the pandemic broke out six months later. It was a learning experience.

57.	I enjoy planning travel itineraries, and often do it for friends and acquaintances. I use this opportunity to recommend certain museums and send them old class notes on famous artworks. They usually decline.

58.	Another thing I find myself doing often as a favour is helping friends and acquaintances apply to school overseas and prepare for the TOEFL exam, just like I did. I used to do this for a living, but much to my bank account’s chagrin, I stopped.

59.	Every year on Yom Kippur, I do a puzzle. I don’t like religion, but I am fond of how this day (and Shabbat, to a lesser extent) is more laid back, compared to the rest of the year. Playing board games with friends is great fun.

60.	Studying art has transformed the way I view it. Partially for the better, partially by ruining my ability to enjoy books and movies. I analyse them too much, as if tearing them apart in class. Novels, for example, I imagine critiquing in workshop. I used to go out to the movies 1-3 times a week during award season, but now barely watch films anymore. Mostly old ones at home. When I find something that blows my mind, though, I will not shut up about it, and rewatch it.

61.	The same goes with music. I mostly listen to albums, and if I find one I like, I will listen to it for 1-3 months. So I am very slow, albeit thorough, when it comes to catching up with music.

62.	I used to pull all-nighters to watch the Oscars live. Now, I watch it the day after, but stay clear off the internet to avoid spoilers. I yell at the screen when they make the wrong decisions the way guys do when they watch sports.

63.	Sports, as a matter of fact, is something I never watch – unless it’s the Olympics, which I watch religiously.

64.	I once wrote a paper in philosophy class analysing the Bible, AKA Mean Girls (2004), using Hegel’s master-slave dialectics. I handed my professor the paper alongside a USB stick containing the movie. Next class, he called the movie “utterly silly”, but gave me a good mark. This paper remains one of my crowning achievements.

65.	Most of my papers in high school and uni were wild: I strove to take my analyses to the extreme. Like that time I argued that Gatsby was black; that Emma is the first detective novel in history; when I compared Fantastic Beasts 1 to the flood myth; or wrote about songs by Nirvana, Green Day, and Dire Straits.

66.	I once gave a lecture in uni arguing Harry Potter and the Cursed Child was a revolutionary work of fiction by comparing it to to My Immortal and other works of fan-fiction. This lecture may or may not be available online for viewing. (The first time I went to London was in June 2016, to see Cursed Child. The second time was in September 2017, to see it again.)

67.	People think I’m a big fantasy and sci-fi nerd. I’m not. I’ve never seen Star Wars or Star Trek, and I have no idea how Dungeons & Dragons is played. I can’t wait for the superhero genre to perish. As for fantasy, after Harry Potter, I think the genre can use a facelift.

68.	I’ve never been drunk. I don’t derive enjoyment out of alcohol; it makes me sleepy, and gives me a headache. When I tell people this, they always say: “that’s the point where you have to keep drinking.” I am slightly afraid of doing so and discovering what I’m like when I’m drunk.

69.	I think the worst thing you can call someone is boring.

70.	I think the best way to describe me is if SpongeBob and Squidward had a child. If I ever have my own place, I’ll hang a painting of Squidward’s Bold and Brash in the living room.

71.	Another way to describe me is if Hermione and Snape had a child. (Sorry for that image.) Hell, throw Dumbledore into the mix, too. I feel like JK Rowling gets me.

72.	I had one of those old Sony Ericsson brick phones until I was almost 19, caved into technology, and switched to smartphones, on 21 January 2014. Before that, I didn’t have WhatsApp, nor was I on Facebook. If I wanted to text my friends, I had to be succinct, as if Tweeting. They were not-really-but-sort-of mad at me for requiring special notice before group outings. Suffice to say I am not too fond of the way smartphones have taken over our lives. I always turn mine off at night, and charge it in another room. But I can’t live without it now, because the day I got my first one was incidentally the day I passed my driving test. Thank god for navigation apps.

73.	My feet stopped growing when I was 13 or 14. But I gained some height between 24-25. Go figure.

74.	I worked in quality assurance for 5.5 years, so I got a bit of a taste of the tech world. I never want to have an office job again.

75.	I used to care what people thought about me. But at this (low) point in my life, I have nothing left to lose. I don’t mind sharing the following private thoughts on the internet. I could die tomorrow.

76.	I think we are all born pansexual, and society conditions us to repress it. Everyone has that one person out there who can turn their world upside down, regardless of their sexual identity. To me, what someone radiates is more important than their organs or appearance. Thus, I think sexuality is so dynamic and fluid, that it could never be determined and defined.

77.	For example, sometimes I find myself on the asexuality spectrum. But not always. It changes.

78.	When it comes to books, movies, or music, I don’t have a favourite genre. When it comes to people, I don’t have a type. I am open to everything and everyone, as long as it is, or they, are interesting. I don’t know how people can limit themselves to one thing.

79.	I had no idea sexuality was a concept that people used to define themselves (and, annoyingly, others) until middle school. Guess who I learned it from, straight people or queer. I didn’t think this concept applied to me back then, and I don’t think it applies to me now, although I did let it get to me for a while. Between the ages of 13-17, I called myself gay, even after I’d developed an attraction toward the opposite sex. Now I can’t understand the modern obsession with labels. Even the Bible doesn’t say anything about sexual identity; only sexual behaviour.

80.	I don’t have a gender. I use he/him out of necessity (though I might use singular they if I lived in the Anglosphere). Pronouns are important to some people, but to me they’re a meaningless and purely grammatical way of referral. Also, I’m not trans.

81.	I reluctantly identify as aromantic. I’ve never had romantic feelings for anyone, and I don’t know if I’ll ever have. Why? Maybe my brain is wired differently. I want to fall in love, simply to understand what all the fuss is about – but if there is such a thing as true love, I doubt I’ll be able to find it by dating. If the first time I met someone was on a date, I might start to think of them as a potential partner; I would see them in a certain way, which I wouldn’t have under different circumstances. (Like Charlottle from Sex and the City.) For me, true love must blossom organically. First you get the know the person, and only later realise you want to be with them. I think Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice (1813) and Emma (1816) are the greatest love stories ever told because of that.

82.	I despise the concept of coming out. It’s a pernicious symptom of heteronormativity. I was never in a closet: society put me in one. I wish I lived in a world where people didn’t assume everyone was born cishet.

83.	I think gender, money, nations, and religion are silly inventions that stand in the way of world peace. The end of human-on-human crime, therefore, could never stem from laws and politics, but from society and its values. (Don’t punish criminals; educate them not to do crimes.) The single best way to change someone’s values, I think, without brainwashing them or pressuring them to change their mind about something, is art. Literature, in particular, rises above all other media thanks to its ability to invite us into someone else’s inner world. Finally, I believe that life imitates art, and that to change our lives, we must first change our art.

84.	I think many queer people are worse than straight people. They know what it’s like to be a minority and feel like the odd one out, yet act even more exclusionary and judgmental than cishets. I suppose this is an inevitable outcome of the gay rights movements: the less adversary a person faces, the less empathic they might become.

85.	Every ten years, something about the wires in my brain changes, and I view the world differently. When I turned 16, I developed an attraction toward women, and began finding inspiration and ideas for novels on a daily basis. When I turned 26, the latter recurred with songs. I can’t help but think of JK Rowling always getting her ideas while in vehicles. I guess I operate temporally, rather than spatially. I remember an interview where she wondered what would happen if she went on a space shuttle. Likewise, I wonder what will happen to me at 36. Hopefully I will find exercise inspiring.

86.	I used to be intensely shy. It took me forever to open up to someone, and even when I did, I was like an onion, because I still kept so many layers. But now I’m an open book. Ironically, people reading my novel for the first time is what made me that. It’s a cliché, but what doesn’t kill you really does make you stronger. My MA workshops almost broke me, yet today I am grateful for them. To be a writer – to pour your soul onto the page and share it with the world – I think you must be an open book.

87.	I don’t believe in unconditional love. Love is a work in progress. It must be won. It can be lost. I don’t know how it can be taken for granted. You can’t treat people like shit and expect their love in return.

88.	Moments that changed my life include: reading 1984 in seventh grade; turning 16; taking cinema in high school; reading Antigone in tenth grade; watching 2001 in eleventh grade; watching a certain episode of South Park in twelfth grade and reading Frankenstein, Dorian Gray, and She; reading Hegel, Kant, and Althusser in my undergrad and studying anything related to Greece, gender, psychoanalysis, and neuro-aesthetics; watching the ocean at sunset in Seychelles; being read by others in grad school; and driving to a friend’s birthday party shortly after turning 26. This list is not comprehensive, and hopefully has a part 2.

89.	My personality, and everything I seek in life, can be summed up in three words: all or nothing. When I do something, I commit to it all the way. Now that I think about it, I might be the real-life version of Dominique Francon.

90.	My biggest fear is death. My second biggest fear is the prospect of dying before sharing with the world all the stories and songs in my head. As time goes by, this prospect begins to feel more and more real.