By Mala Yousafzai (with Christine Lamb)
In 2012, Taliban gunmen shot a 15-year-old Pakistani girl for advocating education for girls.
During a period from about 2000-2014, the Taliban intermittently controlled Pakistan's swat Valley and some adjacent areas. They (wrongly) asserted that Islam forbade girls' education and that women should observe strict purdah, remaining at home and venturing outside only when covered in the restrictive burka.
Malala Yousafzai was raised in Pakistan's verdant and somewhat remote Swat Valley. Her father had opened several schools schools there and was himself a strong voice for education for all. In her own voice, Malala shares her father's efforts to bring schools to the community and her own experience as a schoolgirl. She is smart and competitive, with a keen interest in politics. She has two younger brothers, lots of extended family, and her home houses frequent overnight guests in this land where extending hospitality is considered a duty, not an option.
As Malala moves into her teen years, the Taliban becomes more powerful, trying to exert sharia law and conflicting with a government that seems weak. She recalls her reaction to 9/11, Benazir Bhutto's assassination, and the capture of Osama Bin Ladn. The Taliban kill anyone who challenge their outrageous beliefs, including government officials and family friends of the Yousafzai family.
But it's still shocking - and heartbreaking - that they'd attack a child. Malala is on a school bus with friends when a man boards the bus and shoots her in the head. While she survives and initially receives good care in a Peshawar hospital, her brain begins to swell and it's clear that she will need more care than her local hospital can provide. Incredibly, a pair of doctors from Birmingham, UK "happen" to be visiting that hospital to help treat wounded soldiers while Malala is there. Through secretive and complicated efforts (largely due to help Pakistan save face), Malala in flown (on a UAE jet) to Birmingham, where she slowly recovers.
While Malala longs for her beloved Swat Valley, she still resides in the UK and is currently studying at Oxford. She has garnered numerous awards on behalf of her activism for education, including the Nobel Peace Prize.
In 2012, Taliban gunmen shot a 15-year-old Pakistani girl for advocating education for girls.
During a period from about 2000-2014, the Taliban intermittently controlled Pakistan's swat Valley and some adjacent areas. They (wrongly) asserted that Islam forbade girls' education and that women should observe strict purdah, remaining at home and venturing outside only when covered in the restrictive burka.
Malala Yousafzai was raised in Pakistan's verdant and somewhat remote Swat Valley. Her father had opened several schools schools there and was himself a strong voice for education for all. In her own voice, Malala shares her father's efforts to bring schools to the community and her own experience as a schoolgirl. She is smart and competitive, with a keen interest in politics. She has two younger brothers, lots of extended family, and her home houses frequent overnight guests in this land where extending hospitality is considered a duty, not an option.
As Malala moves into her teen years, the Taliban becomes more powerful, trying to exert sharia law and conflicting with a government that seems weak. She recalls her reaction to 9/11, Benazir Bhutto's assassination, and the capture of Osama Bin Ladn. The Taliban kill anyone who challenge their outrageous beliefs, including government officials and family friends of the Yousafzai family.
But it's still shocking - and heartbreaking - that they'd attack a child. Malala is on a school bus with friends when a man boards the bus and shoots her in the head. While she survives and initially receives good care in a Peshawar hospital, her brain begins to swell and it's clear that she will need more care than her local hospital can provide. Incredibly, a pair of doctors from Birmingham, UK "happen" to be visiting that hospital to help treat wounded soldiers while Malala is there. Through secretive and complicated efforts (largely due to help Pakistan save face), Malala in flown (on a UAE jet) to Birmingham, where she slowly recovers.
While Malala longs for her beloved Swat Valley, she still resides in the UK and is currently studying at Oxford. She has garnered numerous awards on behalf of her activism for education, including the Nobel Peace Prize.
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