Book Review #54: I am Malala - The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and was Shot By Taliban By Malala Yousafzai

I am quite sure that those of you who have heard or listened to this young girl’s story would be exclaiming in surprise “She is one tough teenager!” I am also one of them after reading her biography or rather her little story of how this assassination attempt by Taliban has brought this young girl to the outside world. Before I started to read this book, I was under the impression or rather you can say it as ignorance that, what this girl of age 15 has done to Pakistan that has garnered so much attention. And, this book has a simple answer to all those people who are waiting or expecting to know something about this girl’s fight for girl’s education.

Well this book speaks about length and breadth of the problems that any common Pakistani will face in a day to day life. Without giving much importance to the country’s rotten politics or army’s bad attitude or the constant terror threats and attacks, a regular Pakistani especially those who hail from this remote valley called Swat. She writes about her family and its background in the initial few chapters. She also goes on explaining about Swat and its people and how they are more connected to Afghanistan than Pakistan. She describes the cultural practices of a regular Pashtun household.

Speaking about her daring challenge to the terrorist outfits like Taliban who banned girl’s education in their valley, she was well prepared by her father Ziauddin Yousafzai. He is really a good father and a great human being I can say. He was the one who started the English type school in Swat valley at the very beginning. With regular threats from the local mullah’s and other influential hardcore Islamic people, he stood for what he is capable of and ran a school and became one of the respectable persons in and around the Swat valley and in Pakistan.

When it comes to Malala Yousafzai, she started her work towards the girls’ education rights at a tender age of 11. Like any teenager she was also enjoying her family time and all those happy moments with her family. She loved her little family that consists of her mother, father and her two little brothers Kushal and Atal. Ziauddin Yousafzai named his school after his elder son Kushal. It is one of the famous schools in Swat valley today. Malala started to get attention from the public because of her numerous speeches and interviews she was giving regularly. She often travelled across the Pakistan to spread the message of girl’s education.  

The turning point in her life came in when BBC Urdu was looking out of someone who can give firsthand information about the Swat region when it was under Taliban control. With a strong persuasion from her uncle, Malala started to write for BBC Urdu under the pen name “GUL MAKAY”. This has got some great attention from across the world and of course it also brought Malala under the radar of Taliban. Malala and her family used to receive threats and threat notes from unknown sources about their activities. They went ahead and threatened to bomb their school if they won’t stop the girl’s school. But she wasn't the type of quitters. She managed to do well in getting the attention of their government and was getting support from them to bring education to everyone especially girls.

She also wrote about many other details about the Taliban rule and how people initially supported the group by donating money to them. She writes about few dreaded people like Fazlullah, the radio mullah and other Taliban members. For sure, this book will give us a load of information regarding the Taliban regime.

One point which I thought was very unnecessary was her rant about India. She wrote on many occasions that, India is the greatest enemy of Pakistan and some rubbish details about India and Pakistan relationship. We can ignore this part and move on to read other stuffs.

The stirring details of how Malala was shot by Taliban guy in her school bus and the after incident of her treatment and she was flown to UK is a well-known phenomenon.  She thanked numerous doctors and caretakers from both the countries are a nice gesture. She was under induced coma for almost a week and her fighting spirits to get back on heels is a tremendous journey. She described her injuries and other details in great details which can be read in book.

There is a photography section in the book where she posted some of her pictures from her childhood and few pictures from the hospital where she was taking treatment. It’s a nice way to put all those things.

Overall a great attempt by Malala to write all these things. We all know that there are certain sections of the people who hate her and who love her. Leaving aside all those things, she stands as an inspiration for many young girls in Pakistan and around the world. Their family is living in UK now with a little or no plan of returning to Pakistan in future. May be, one day she would visit Pakistan as a politician which she aspired to become.

My Rating:

5/5

Book Review #34: And The Mountains Echoed By Khaled Hosseini

There are few authors who can be termed as true storytellers and there are few like chetan bhagat. Khaled Hosseini is a master when it comes to storytelling. He gave us, the readers, what can be called as an emotionally charged novel. Without a second thought, this is one of the finest books I've read in recent times.

And The Mountains Echoed a third novel from Hosseini, captures a typical Afghanistan family of the 1950′s followed by the Soviet’s attack in late 60′s to 70′s and the invasion of Taliban, etc..

The story beings by a fairy tale that a father (Saboor) is narrating to his kids (Abdullah and Pari) in a remote village called Shadbagh in Afghanistan. This was an everyday scene in Saboor’s family. To make the ends meet and to win daily bread and also to support his new pregnant wife (yes, the 2nd one), Saboor takes an unexpected step through selling his younger daughter Pari, to a wealthy couple in Kabul who are childless. Pari was barely 3 years old when she was sold by her father. Pari was not aware of such consequence, but her brother Abdullah who was 7 years old, was devastated by this cruel act of his father.

Everyday Abdullah gets reminded of her little sister every now and then, all those happy moment playing with her, all those little gifts that he had bought for his sister, etc.. Pari loved the birds feather like it was a diamond in possession. Abdullah carefully collected all these feathers over the years to gift her and see the joy in her little sisters face. Now, all those moments have been crushed to sands and now he is all alone in the house. Later events makes him to run to Pakistan and he starts working in a restaurant and few years later he travels to USA along with his wife and daughter Pari (Yes, he named his daughter as Pari) and starts his own Kebab restaurant.

The entire story is captured from 1950 till 2010 that spans over more than 50 years. Pari’s new parents, Nila wahdati, a poet by passion and Suleiman Wahdati an artist. Even here, there is a tragedy, Nila divorces her husband and takes Pari to France forever. Then the novel takes another turn, describing Pari’s life in France, her bonding with her new mom, her college life, etc.. But, Pari often gets a jolt sometimes that, she is missing something, like she is not born to Nila and she constantly gets reminded of a little village where she was born somewhere buried deep in her memory.

The novel has many characters and many stories that was probably unnecessary to the novel. There is one character called Nabi, the driver of Suleiman Wahdati and also maternal uncle of Pari and Abdullah, who actually sets the stage for Wahdati couple to buy his sister’s daughter Pari. Later in the novel, Nabi writes a long letter to Mr. Markos, a plastic surgeon, working in Afghanistan for over 10 years. He describes what all the things he has done, and he also mentions about Pari.

All those hardships and fights and long waits to reconcile is described in the last 2 chapters, which is a must read from the book. After all, will Pari and Abdullah meet in the end ??. Will old Abdullah be able recognize her sister old Pari ? You must read that in the book. I stop it at this point, so readers can actually go and read this novel. For sure, its an emotional roller coaster ride for both Pari and Abdullah. Hosseini has captured this very essence brilliantly and carried it throughout the novel. I assure you, you will be restless to witness the climax.

My Rating:

4/5