My name is Wasim Zoghbi, 22 years old from Bethlehem - West Bank. In January I was accepted to participate in the five month BICS (B-level International Conflict Studies) course in Uppsala University, Sweden. I was very glad to hear that. I started my trip with many difficulties because of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. First of all I had to go to the Swedish Consulate in Jerusalem, which is under the Israeli control, to hand my "passport" to the VISA section. It was hard to cross Bethlehem checkpoint without a permit. Getting a permit takes time and I was in a great hurry. So I sneaked around from a way known as Tantur, which is "dangerous". A number of people have been killed and injured near this checkpoint, the Bethlehem checkpoint. Two days later I received a call from the Consulate to take the "passport" with the VISA. This time I sent one of my friends who holds a Jerusalem I.D. to take it from the Consulate.

After that, I had to go to the British Airways office in Jerusalem to take the plane tickets, the same checkpoint problem occurred because I did not have permission. Anyway, at this point I now had the ticket and the "passport" with the VISA. I had to take these two documents in addition to my West Bank I.D to the District Coordination Office to make a special permission for the Ben-Gurion airport in Tel-viv. This permission has special stamps and limited time; mine was from 3:00 until 12:00 on February 3, 1999. The day for travel came, and after one hour driving from Bethlehem I reached the airport at 5:00 o'clock, 3 hours before the departure time. The Israeli security was ready to ask me a lot of questions and to inspect every part of my luggage not just by the x-ray. Finally, I answered the questions successfully and was then able to go to the departure gate. The flight took five hours from Tel-viv to London, then two hours and half to Stockholm airport. Six different nationality students were waiting for the two of us, me and another Palestinian from Jenin. They took us to Uppsala, we drank a cup of coffee then I went to sleep in my room.

Next day I went to the department, and I introduced myself to the whole class, after that I was given full information about the entire course. The course was divided into three parts: analytical perspective, regional contexts & management and prevention. I took many lectures about different types of conflict; ethnic, environmental, children, women, global news, refugees, etc... I learned also about the international law, UN Security Council and the United Nations. Special cases were discussed such us the Kurdish struggle, Holocaust, Yugoslavia, Chiapas, Caucasus region, etc... And theories were applied to some of them. In addition, each student had to do two academic papers around 20 pages each about two conflicts. I did about the conflict between Egypt regime and Al-Gama'at Al-Islamiyah and the other about the water conflict in Africa. In April the whole class traveled to Geneva. We visited the United Nations, a Human Rights organization, the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, The International Committee of the Red Cross, and United Nations High Commission for Refugees.

Away from the academics, the social life was so beautiful. I used to go to a place called The Nations, to dance, enjoy and chat with friends. I visited many families during my stay: Swedish, Polish, and Palestinian families. Despite the diversity among the students who came from different countries and cultures I managed to have good relations with them and I got to know some of their culture. Wherever I went I spread the word of Wi'am which is a message of peace and reconciliation.

Special thanks go to Wi'am Center who helped me a lot, to SIDA (Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency) who granted me the scholarship, Mary-Jane Fox & Goshka Wojtasik at the 'Department of Peace and Conflict Research' for their academic and endless assistance. Your Support to the Palestinians will not come to an end.

To conclude,- international education will help the Palestinian people to increase their academic knowledge and to learn more about other cultures and meet international students and teachers. Then, upon returning, to integrate the new ideas in the Palestinian society through different organizations like Wi'am Center, Conflict Resolution Center located in Bethlehem.