Book Review #51 : I Am Malala - "The Story of the Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban" by Malala Yousafzai and Christina Lamb (Primary Contributor)

 

Honestly saying, before reading this book, I knew nothing about Malala except the global facts. I don’t generally say this a lot, but now, I am her fan. She is younger than me, Oh my god! What a courageous experience she holds. I believe some books are meant to be read just to revisit the realities one had faced and how they have tried to fit in their major lifetime in mere words/book. And this. This is that book.

Through this book, she has shown plenty of sides of her own life, the political and army point of action in the country, the Taliban effect on and off, the patriarchal norms of Pashtuns’ traditions, the backward thinking in people’s perception and lots more. She showed the heavenly landscapes through her words. She started the prologue with a revolutionary title “The day my world changed”, that she really meant. You will be amazed how the incident of being shot made her universe upside down. 

All the segregation/chapters of this book are tried to fit in the sync but I somewhere found quite jumbled in the starting of it. But this is acceptable, come on - it’s human tendency, to revisit the fainted memory on and on in between the latest mental impressions. And that’s I think the best rendition of real narration. She has presented two worlds of her motherland “Swat” - before and after Taliban. Honestly, readers will be flabbergasted by getting the details of her early life, how her family suffered for a small penny, how growing up in a small room and getting no privacy at all, how political and natural calamities had destroyed lives of thousands. From her very early life, she was so determined to reform the society, and I could strongly see, it was because of her father’s upbringing. Because of him, the courage to do something better for the world came into an obvious thing to do. 

You will get to know the other side of Pakistan, its army and Taliban through the eyes of common people. The everyday fear of surviving, and struggling to get the right kind of education was always a dreadful task for all. 

Through many ups and downs, she had shown the rising graph of awareness to the world. But for this, she had to pay the price eventually. Many communities had claimed that her incident of being shot by Taliban was fake, but seriously, ask them to read her journey. 

There’s a statement by her - “We human beings don’t realize how great God is. He has given us an extraordinary brain and a sensitive loving heart. He has blessed us with two lips to talk and express our feelings, two eyes which see a world of colors and beauty, two feet which walk on the road of life, two hands to work for us, a nose which smells the beauty of fragrance, and two ears to hear the words of love. As I found with my ear, no one knows how much power they have in each and every organ until they lose them”. This was the ultimatum we take for granted in our lives. She had gone through so many surgeries, hospitals, countries, therapies and years to recover from that one bullet. I won’t deny, I googled so many things after reading her and my respect for her existence went above clouds. Undoubtedly she deserves the Nobel prize for peace. 

I know, reading non-fiction books is boring for many, but I believe they have real thrills and a lot to learn, for our realities. I highly recommend everyone to read her journey and be thankful for the awesome life we have.