躑躅(つつじ)が満開。道端の躑躅が満開。
いつもより少し早いのかな？
3～４日前から、高熱が続いたのでコロナを懸念して都の発熱相談センターに連絡。近くの発熱外来を開いているクリニックを紹介していただく。時間指定されて、時間に訪問。
専用の通路から処置室に案内されドクターを待つ。問診を受け、容器を渡される。ご覧のような入れ物。ここに唾液を最低一目盛り入れるように支持される。
翌日には連絡有るとのことで、電話待っていたら、結果は「陰性」。
良かった。
でもなんとなく微熱が続くので、また明日クリニックを訪問しようと考えている。
なんとも落ち着かない数日。
下高井戸シネマという、こじんまりした映画館に、ウッディアレンの映画を
見にいった。
ウッディアレンの映画は一頃、熱心に見に通ったが、今回は
久しぶりの映画となり、以前とは異なった趣に、何かなぁという
気分だった。
それはさておき、下高井戸という駅は、京王線と東急世田谷線が
乗り入れているのを初めてしった。
下高井戸シネマに行くのに、京王線を降りて、階段を回り込むように
して道路にでるのだけれど、途中で東急世田谷線の終着ホームに面する
ことになる。
そこに入ってきたのが、まるでジブリの猫バスならぬ、猫電車！！
思わず携帯で撮影してしまった。
なかなか味わい深い表情でした。
見にいった。
ウッディアレンの映画は一頃、熱心に見に通ったが、今回は
久しぶりの映画となり、以前とは異なった趣に、何かなぁという
気分だった。
それはさておき、下高井戸という駅は、京王線と東急世田谷線が
乗り入れているのを初めてしった。
下高井戸シネマに行くのに、京王線を降りて、階段を回り込むように
して道路にでるのだけれど、途中で東急世田谷線の終着ホームに面する
ことになる。
そこに入ってきたのが、まるでジブリの猫バスならぬ、猫電車！！
思わず携帯で撮影してしまった。
なかなか味わい深い表情でした。
この猫の顔はなんだ？
ほとんど化け猫のように見える。
実はこれ、宮川香山（みやがわこうざん）という陶芸家の
作品で、サントリー美術館で、宮川香山没後１００年展が
2月24日から始まるというポスターを撮ったものです。
宮川香山は明治時代の日本を代表する陶工で、立体的な
装飾をほどこした焼き物で、海外の博覧会にも出品して
好評を博したとか。
この画像は、香山の焼き物の上部を飾る猫を専門家である
写真家が撮影し、それを原版としてオフセット印刷した
ポスターを、私がケータイの写真で撮影し、それをgoo
ブログにアップしたものです。
それでもこの迫力！
細部に渡る表現に驚かされます。
ほとんど化け猫のように見える。
実はこれ、宮川香山（みやがわこうざん）という陶芸家の
作品で、サントリー美術館で、宮川香山没後１００年展が
2月24日から始まるというポスターを撮ったものです。
宮川香山は明治時代の日本を代表する陶工で、立体的な
装飾をほどこした焼き物で、海外の博覧会にも出品して
好評を博したとか。
この画像は、香山の焼き物の上部を飾る猫を専門家である
写真家が撮影し、それを原版としてオフセット印刷した
ポスターを、私がケータイの写真で撮影し、それをgoo
ブログにアップしたものです。
それでもこの迫力！
細部に渡る表現に驚かされます。
明けまして、おめでとうございます。
うつ病の回復に少しは効果があるのかなぁと始めたこのブログも、
当初の家のまわりの情景から、体調の回復とともに、活動範囲を
広げ、自転車での活動も加わり、ブログタイトルに納まりきれなく
なってしまいました。
昨年は、縁あってフランスのバスク地方への旅行も叶い、その
旅行記を書こうと思ったのですが、身辺雑事でブログを書く時間が
生み出せず、歯がゆい思いをしました。
今年は、いろいろな意味で身辺整理をし、旅行記を完成させようと
おもいます。
興味がありましたら、ご一読ください。
今年も、皆様にとって良い年でありますよう、お祈りいたします。
うつ病の回復に少しは効果があるのかなぁと始めたこのブログも、
当初の家のまわりの情景から、体調の回復とともに、活動範囲を
広げ、自転車での活動も加わり、ブログタイトルに納まりきれなく
なってしまいました。
昨年は、縁あってフランスのバスク地方への旅行も叶い、その
旅行記を書こうと思ったのですが、身辺雑事でブログを書く時間が
生み出せず、歯がゆい思いをしました。
今年は、いろいろな意味で身辺整理をし、旅行記を完成させようと
おもいます。
興味がありましたら、ご一読ください。
今年も、皆様にとって良い年でありますよう、お祈りいたします。
一年の計は元旦にあり。
子供のころ、この言葉を聞いて、「なに言ってるんだか。いつだって
思い立ったらなんでもできるさ。」と思っていた。
歳を経て、残る人生のほうが少なくなってきた今、この言葉の持つ
意味が、今更ながら身に沁みる。
計画を立てたとしても、そのうち実行に移せるのは一割くらいか。
実行に移し、所定の成果を上げるのは、厳しく見積もって、さらに
その一割とすると、計画して成果まで結びつくのは、１％に過ぎない
ことになる。
ましてや、計画を立てなければ、あっという間に一年は過ぎていく。
先人の知恵に敬服するばかりだ。
新しい手帳に、今年の目標を書いて、スケジュールに落とし込んで
悔いのない一年を過ごすつもりです。
子供のころ、この言葉を聞いて、「なに言ってるんだか。いつだって
思い立ったらなんでもできるさ。」と思っていた。
歳を経て、残る人生のほうが少なくなってきた今、この言葉の持つ
意味が、今更ながら身に沁みる。
計画を立てたとしても、そのうち実行に移せるのは一割くらいか。
実行に移し、所定の成果を上げるのは、厳しく見積もって、さらに
その一割とすると、計画して成果まで結びつくのは、１％に過ぎない
ことになる。
ましてや、計画を立てなければ、あっという間に一年は過ぎていく。
先人の知恵に敬服するばかりだ。
新しい手帳に、今年の目標を書いて、スケジュールに落とし込んで
悔いのない一年を過ごすつもりです。
２００７年１０月に、かなりウツ状態がひどくなり、気分転換に
なるかもしれないと、このブログを書き始めた。
当然のように、書く事といえば、自分を中心にして半径５０メートル
くらいの風景ぐらいしかないものだから、タイトルも新深川百景として
近所の光景を１００件くらいアップできれば上等との思いではじめた
このブログ。
もう７年も続けていることになる。鬱も完治（鬱に完治というのが
あるのか疑問で、軽快しているというのが正直なところか）はして
いないが、まぁ普通の生活をしている。
健康になるにつれて、行動半径も広がっていき、深川に収まらなく
なってしまった。
自分から仕事を剥ぎ取って、のこって行くものは何か？と自身に問えば
エスプレッソコーヒーを自分で淹れて、本（古本屋から探し出してきた
ような本）を読み、健康と気分転換のための自転車乗りと、そのメンテ
ナンスくらいかなぁと思い至った。
会社も、色々な人が入ってきては、親しい人々が定年や、こころの病で
辞めていって、寂しくなるばかりだ。
日々の心に残った事々を、ぼちぼち記録していこうと考えている。
なるかもしれないと、このブログを書き始めた。
当然のように、書く事といえば、自分を中心にして半径５０メートル
くらいの風景ぐらいしかないものだから、タイトルも新深川百景として
近所の光景を１００件くらいアップできれば上等との思いではじめた
このブログ。
もう７年も続けていることになる。鬱も完治（鬱に完治というのが
あるのか疑問で、軽快しているというのが正直なところか）はして
いないが、まぁ普通の生活をしている。
健康になるにつれて、行動半径も広がっていき、深川に収まらなく
なってしまった。
自分から仕事を剥ぎ取って、のこって行くものは何か？と自身に問えば
エスプレッソコーヒーを自分で淹れて、本（古本屋から探し出してきた
ような本）を読み、健康と気分転換のための自転車乗りと、そのメンテ
ナンスくらいかなぁと思い至った。
会社も、色々な人が入ってきては、親しい人々が定年や、こころの病で
辞めていって、寂しくなるばかりだ。
日々の心に残った事々を、ぼちぼち記録していこうと考えている。
今日はクリスマスイブ。
会社では、若い人たちが何気ない振りをしながら、
なにやら楽しそうな雰囲気。仲間内の飲み会か
カップルでゆっくり過ごすのか。
中年を遥か超えた年代は、なにか特別な行事が
あるわけでもなく、淡々と時間が過ぎていく。
大昔、街に酔っぱらいが溢れて、「メリークリスマス」
なんぞと言って、大騒ぎをしたのは、昭和の高度成長期
のほんのひと時だったのかもしれない。
成熟した日本社会をゆっくり考えるには、今日は
いい日なのかもしれない。
そういう意味で「メリークリスマス！」
会社では、若い人たちが何気ない振りをしながら、
なにやら楽しそうな雰囲気。仲間内の飲み会か
カップルでゆっくり過ごすのか。
中年を遥か超えた年代は、なにか特別な行事が
あるわけでもなく、淡々と時間が過ぎていく。
大昔、街に酔っぱらいが溢れて、「メリークリスマス」
なんぞと言って、大騒ぎをしたのは、昭和の高度成長期
のほんのひと時だったのかもしれない。
成熟した日本社会をゆっくり考えるには、今日は
いい日なのかもしれない。
そういう意味で「メリークリスマス！」
マララ・ユスフザイさんがノーベル平和賞を受賞したのは、
皆さんご存知の通りです。
日本のマスコミがマララさんのスピーチに触れたのはほんの
一瞬と思えました。
そんなのはノーベル賞の本質ではないでしょう。
以下は、マララさんの受賞にあたってのスピーチ全文です。
著作権は当然マララさんが持っているのでしょうが、それを
朝日新聞が記事にしたので、その英文を引用させてもらいます。
格調高い文章で、１７歳でも優れた人は世の中に居るのだと実感。
英語の教科書の題材にしても良いとおもいます。
それ以上に、過酷な現実に置かれた多くの子供、女性たちに自分と
して何ができるのかを考えさせられる内容です。以下引用－－－－
Bismillah ir rahman ir rahim. In the name of God, the most merciful,
the most beneficent.
Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, distinguished members of the
Norwegian Nobel Committee,
dear sisters and brothers, today is a day of great happiness for me.
I am humbled that the Nobel Committee has selected me for this
precious award.
Thank you to everyone for your continued support and love.
Thank you for the letters and cards that I still receive from
all around the world.
Your kind and encouraging words strengthen and inspire me.
I would like to thank my parents for their unconditional love.
Thank you to my father for not clipping my wings and for letting
me fly. Thank you to my mother for inspiring me to be patient
and to always speak the truth――which we strongly believe is
the true message of Islam.
And also thank you to all my wonderful teachers, who inspired me to
believe in myself and be brave.
I am very proud to be the first Pashtun, the first Pakistani,
and the youngest person to receive this award.
Along with that, I am pretty certain that I am also the first
recipient of the NobelPeace Prize who still fights with her
younger brothers. I want there to be peace everywhere, but
my brothers and I are still working on that.
I am also honored to receive this award together with Kailash
Satyarthi,who has been a champion for children's rights for
a long time. Twice as long, in fact, than Ihave been alive.
I am proud that we can work together and show the world that
an Indian and a Pakistani――they can work
together and achieve their goals of children's rights.
Dear brothers and sisters, I was named after the inspirational
Malalaiof Maiwand, who is the Pashtun Joan of Arc.
The word Malala means “grief stricken", “sad", but in order to
lend some happiness to it, my grandfather would always call me
Malala――The happiest girl in this world and today I am very
happy that we are together fighting for an important cause.
This award is not just for me. It is for those forgotten children
who want education.
It is for those frightened children who want peace. It is for those
voiceless children who want change.
I am here to stand up for their rights, to raise their voice...
it is not time to pity them.
It is time to take action so it becomes the last time that we see a
child deprived of education.
I have found that people describe me in many different ways.
Some people call me the girl who was shot by the Taliban.
And some, the girl who fought for her rights.
Some people call me a “Nobel Laureate" now.However, my brothers
still call me “that annoying,bossy sister."
As far as I know, I am just a committed and even stubborn person
who wants to see every child getting quality education,
who wants to see women having equal rights,and who wants peace
in every corner of the world.
Education is one of the blessings of life――and one of its
necessities.
That has been my experience during the 17 years of my life.
In my paradise home, Swat, I always loved learning and
discovering new things. I remember when my friends and I would
decorate our hands with henna on special occasions,
and instead of drawing flowers and patterns we would paint our
hands with mathematical formulas and equations.
We had a thirst for education because our future was right there
in that classroom.
We would sit and learn and read together. We loved to wear neat
and tidy school uniforms and we would sit there with big dreams
in our eyes.
We wanted to make our parents proud and prove that we could also
excel in our studies and achieve those goals which some people
think only boys can.
But things did not remain the same. When I was in Swat, which was
a place of tourism and beauty,suddenly changed into a place of
terrorism. I was just 10. More than 400 schools were destroyed.
Women were flogged. People were killed. And our beautiful dreams
turned into nightmares.
Education went from being a right to being a crime.Girls were stopped
from going to school.
When my world suddenly changed, my priorities changed too.
I had two options, one was to remain silent and wait to be killed.
And the second was to speak up and then be killed. I chose the second
one. I decided to speak up.
We could not just stand by and see those injustices of the terrorists,
denying our rights,
ruthlessly killing people, and misusing the name of Islam. We
decided to raise our voice and tell them,
“Have you not learned that in the Holy Quran Allah says if you
kill one person, it is as if you killed the whole humanity?
Do you not know that Muhammad, peace be upon him,
the Prophet of mercy, he says, ‘Do not harm yourself or others?'
And do you not know that the very first word of the Holy Quran is
the word ‘iqra,' which means ‘read?'"
The terrorists tried to stop us and attacked me and my friends who are
here today, on our school bus,
in 2012.But neither their ideas nor bullets could win.
We survived. And since that day, our voices have grown louder and
louder.
I tell my story, not because it is unique, but because it is not.
It is the story of many girls.
Today, I tell their stories too. I have brought with me some of my
sisters, from Pakistan, from Nigeria and from Syria, who share
this story. My brave sisters, Shazia and Kainat who were also
shot that day on our school bus, but they have not stopped learning.
And my brave sister,Kainat-Somro,
who went through severe abuse and extreme violence.
Even her brother was killed,but she did not succumb.
Also, my sisiters here, whom I have met during my Malala Fund
campaign,my 16-year-old courageous sister, Mezon, From Syria,
who now lives in Jordan as a refugee, and she goes from tent to
tentencouraging girls and boys to learn.
And my sister Amina, from the north of Nigeria, where Boko Haram
threatens and stalks girls and
even kidnaps girls, just for wanting to go to school.
Though I appear as one girl, one person, who is 5 foot 2 inches tall,
if you include my high heels.
It means I am 5 foot only. I am not a lone voice, I am many.
I am Malala, but I am also Shazia.
I am Kainat.
I am Kainat-Somro.
I am Mezon.
I am Amina. I am those 66 million girls who are deprived of education.
And today I am not raising my voice; it is the voice of those 66
million girls. Sometimes people like to ask me,
“Why should girls go to school? Why is it important for them?"
But I think the more important question is, “Why shouldn't they?
Why shouldn't they have this right to go to school?"
Dear brothers and sisters,today, in half of the world, we see rapid
progress, and development.
However, there are many countries where millions still suffer from the
very old problems of war,poverty, and injustice.
We still see conflicts in which innocent people lose their lives and
children become orphans.
We see many people becoming refugees in Syria, Gaza and Iraq. In
Afghanistan, we see families
being killed in suicide attacks and bomb blasts.
Many children in Africa do not have access to education because of
poverty. And, as I said,
we still see girls who have no freedom to go to school, in the
north of Nigeria.
Many children in countries like Pakistan and India, as Kailash
Satyarthi mentioned, many children,
especially in India and Pakistan, are deprived of their right to
education because of social taboos,
or they have been forced into child marriage or into child labor.
One of my very good school friends, the same age as me, who has always
been a bold and confident
girl, dreamed of becoming a doctor. But her dream remained a dream. At
the age of 12, she was forced to get married and then soon she had
a son, she had a child, when she herself was a child,only 14.
I know that she could have been a very good doctor, but she couldn't,
because she was a girl.
Her story is why I dedicate the Nobel Peace Prize money to the Malala
Fund, to help give girls quality education everywhere, anywhere,
in the world, and to raise their voices.
The first place this funding will go to is where my heart is, to build
schools in Pakistan,especially in my home of Swat and Shangla.
In my own village there is still no secondary school for girls. And it
is my wish and my commitment,
and now my challenge, to build one, so that my friends and my sisters
can go there to school and get quality education and they get this
opportunity to fulfill their dreams.
This is where I will begin, but it is not where I will stop. I will
continue this fight until I see every child in school.
Dear brothers and sisters, great people who brought change, like
Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela,Mother Teresa and
Aung San Suu Kyi, once stood here on this stage.
I hope the steps that Kailash Satyarthi and I have taken so far, and
will take on this journey,
will also bring change――lasting change.
My great hope is that this will be the last time we must fight for
education.
Let's solve this once and for all.
We have already taken many steps.Now it is time to take a leap.
It is not time to tell the world leaders to realize how important
education is――
they already know it. Their own children are in good schools. Now it
is time to call them to take action, for the rest of the world's
children.
We ask the world leaders to unite and make education their top
priority.
Fifteen years ago, the world leaders decided on a set of global goals,
the Millennium Development Goals. In the years that have followed, we
have seen some progress.
The number of children out of school has been halved, as Kailash
Satyarthi said.
However, the world focused only on primary education and progress did
not reach everyone.
In the year 2015, representatives from all around the world will
meet in the United Nations to set the next set of goals,
the Sustainable Development Goals. This will set the world's
ambition for the next generations.
The world can no longer accept that basic education is enough.
Why do leaders accept that for children in developing countries
only basic literacy is sufficient,
when their own children do homework in algebra, mathematics,
science and physics?
Leaders must seize this opportunity to guarantee a free, quality,
primary and secondary education for every child.
Some will say this is impractical or too expensive or too hard,
or maybe even impossible.
But it is time the world thinks bigger.
Dear sisters and brothers, the so-called world of adults may
understand it, but we children don't.
Why is it that countries which we call “strong" are so powerful in
creating wars but are so weak in bringing peace?
Why is it that giving guns is so easy but giving books is so hard?
Why is it that making tanks is so easy, but building schools is so
hard?
We are living in the modern age, and we believe that nothing is
impossible.We have reached the Moon,
45 years ago, and maybe we will soon land on Mars. Then, in the 21st
century, we must be able to give every child quality education.
Dear sisters and brothers, dear fellow children, we must work...
and not wait.
Not just the politicians and the world leaders, we all need to
contribute.Me,you,we,it is our duty.
Let us become the first generation to decide to be the last.
Let us become the first generation that decides to be the last that
sees empty classrooms,lost childhoods, wasted potentials.
Let this be the last time that a girl or a boy spends their
childhood ina factory.
Let this be the last time that a girl is forced into early child
marriage.
Let this be the last time that a child loses life in war.
Let this be the last time that we see a child out of school.
Let this end with us.
Let's begin this ending.
Together, today, right here, right now, let's begin this ending now.
Thank you so much.Thank you.
皆さんご存知の通りです。
日本のマスコミがマララさんのスピーチに触れたのはほんの
一瞬と思えました。
そんなのはノーベル賞の本質ではないでしょう。
以下は、マララさんの受賞にあたってのスピーチ全文です。
著作権は当然マララさんが持っているのでしょうが、それを
朝日新聞が記事にしたので、その英文を引用させてもらいます。
格調高い文章で、１７歳でも優れた人は世の中に居るのだと実感。
英語の教科書の題材にしても良いとおもいます。
それ以上に、過酷な現実に置かれた多くの子供、女性たちに自分と
して何ができるのかを考えさせられる内容です。以下引用－－－－
Bismillah ir rahman ir rahim. In the name of God, the most merciful,
the most beneficent.
Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, distinguished members of the
Norwegian Nobel Committee,
dear sisters and brothers, today is a day of great happiness for me.
I am humbled that the Nobel Committee has selected me for this
precious award.
Thank you to everyone for your continued support and love.
Thank you for the letters and cards that I still receive from
all around the world.
Your kind and encouraging words strengthen and inspire me.
I would like to thank my parents for their unconditional love.
Thank you to my father for not clipping my wings and for letting
me fly. Thank you to my mother for inspiring me to be patient
and to always speak the truth――which we strongly believe is
the true message of Islam.
And also thank you to all my wonderful teachers, who inspired me to
believe in myself and be brave.
I am very proud to be the first Pashtun, the first Pakistani,
and the youngest person to receive this award.
Along with that, I am pretty certain that I am also the first
recipient of the NobelPeace Prize who still fights with her
younger brothers. I want there to be peace everywhere, but
my brothers and I are still working on that.
I am also honored to receive this award together with Kailash
Satyarthi,who has been a champion for children's rights for
a long time. Twice as long, in fact, than Ihave been alive.
I am proud that we can work together and show the world that
an Indian and a Pakistani――they can work
together and achieve their goals of children's rights.
Dear brothers and sisters, I was named after the inspirational
Malalaiof Maiwand, who is the Pashtun Joan of Arc.
The word Malala means “grief stricken", “sad", but in order to
lend some happiness to it, my grandfather would always call me
Malala――The happiest girl in this world and today I am very
happy that we are together fighting for an important cause.
This award is not just for me. It is for those forgotten children
who want education.
It is for those frightened children who want peace. It is for those
voiceless children who want change.
I am here to stand up for their rights, to raise their voice...
it is not time to pity them.
It is time to take action so it becomes the last time that we see a
child deprived of education.
I have found that people describe me in many different ways.
Some people call me the girl who was shot by the Taliban.
And some, the girl who fought for her rights.
Some people call me a “Nobel Laureate" now.However, my brothers
still call me “that annoying,bossy sister."
As far as I know, I am just a committed and even stubborn person
who wants to see every child getting quality education,
who wants to see women having equal rights,and who wants peace
in every corner of the world.
Education is one of the blessings of life――and one of its
necessities.
That has been my experience during the 17 years of my life.
In my paradise home, Swat, I always loved learning and
discovering new things. I remember when my friends and I would
decorate our hands with henna on special occasions,
and instead of drawing flowers and patterns we would paint our
hands with mathematical formulas and equations.
We had a thirst for education because our future was right there
in that classroom.
We would sit and learn and read together. We loved to wear neat
and tidy school uniforms and we would sit there with big dreams
in our eyes.
We wanted to make our parents proud and prove that we could also
excel in our studies and achieve those goals which some people
think only boys can.
But things did not remain the same. When I was in Swat, which was
a place of tourism and beauty,suddenly changed into a place of
terrorism. I was just 10. More than 400 schools were destroyed.
Women were flogged. People were killed. And our beautiful dreams
turned into nightmares.
Education went from being a right to being a crime.Girls were stopped
from going to school.
When my world suddenly changed, my priorities changed too.
I had two options, one was to remain silent and wait to be killed.
And the second was to speak up and then be killed. I chose the second
one. I decided to speak up.
We could not just stand by and see those injustices of the terrorists,
denying our rights,
ruthlessly killing people, and misusing the name of Islam. We
decided to raise our voice and tell them,
“Have you not learned that in the Holy Quran Allah says if you
kill one person, it is as if you killed the whole humanity?
Do you not know that Muhammad, peace be upon him,
the Prophet of mercy, he says, ‘Do not harm yourself or others?'
And do you not know that the very first word of the Holy Quran is
the word ‘iqra,' which means ‘read?'"
The terrorists tried to stop us and attacked me and my friends who are
here today, on our school bus,
in 2012.But neither their ideas nor bullets could win.
We survived. And since that day, our voices have grown louder and
louder.
I tell my story, not because it is unique, but because it is not.
It is the story of many girls.
Today, I tell their stories too. I have brought with me some of my
sisters, from Pakistan, from Nigeria and from Syria, who share
this story. My brave sisters, Shazia and Kainat who were also
shot that day on our school bus, but they have not stopped learning.
And my brave sister,Kainat-Somro,
who went through severe abuse and extreme violence.
Even her brother was killed,but she did not succumb.
Also, my sisiters here, whom I have met during my Malala Fund
campaign,my 16-year-old courageous sister, Mezon, From Syria,
who now lives in Jordan as a refugee, and she goes from tent to
tentencouraging girls and boys to learn.
And my sister Amina, from the north of Nigeria, where Boko Haram
threatens and stalks girls and
even kidnaps girls, just for wanting to go to school.
Though I appear as one girl, one person, who is 5 foot 2 inches tall,
if you include my high heels.
It means I am 5 foot only. I am not a lone voice, I am many.
I am Malala, but I am also Shazia.
I am Kainat.
I am Kainat-Somro.
I am Mezon.
I am Amina. I am those 66 million girls who are deprived of education.
And today I am not raising my voice; it is the voice of those 66
million girls. Sometimes people like to ask me,
“Why should girls go to school? Why is it important for them?"
But I think the more important question is, “Why shouldn't they?
Why shouldn't they have this right to go to school?"
Dear brothers and sisters,today, in half of the world, we see rapid
progress, and development.
However, there are many countries where millions still suffer from the
very old problems of war,poverty, and injustice.
We still see conflicts in which innocent people lose their lives and
children become orphans.
We see many people becoming refugees in Syria, Gaza and Iraq. In
Afghanistan, we see families
being killed in suicide attacks and bomb blasts.
Many children in Africa do not have access to education because of
poverty. And, as I said,
we still see girls who have no freedom to go to school, in the
north of Nigeria.
Many children in countries like Pakistan and India, as Kailash
Satyarthi mentioned, many children,
especially in India and Pakistan, are deprived of their right to
education because of social taboos,
or they have been forced into child marriage or into child labor.
One of my very good school friends, the same age as me, who has always
been a bold and confident
girl, dreamed of becoming a doctor. But her dream remained a dream. At
the age of 12, she was forced to get married and then soon she had
a son, she had a child, when she herself was a child,only 14.
I know that she could have been a very good doctor, but she couldn't,
because she was a girl.
Her story is why I dedicate the Nobel Peace Prize money to the Malala
Fund, to help give girls quality education everywhere, anywhere,
in the world, and to raise their voices.
The first place this funding will go to is where my heart is, to build
schools in Pakistan,especially in my home of Swat and Shangla.
In my own village there is still no secondary school for girls. And it
is my wish and my commitment,
and now my challenge, to build one, so that my friends and my sisters
can go there to school and get quality education and they get this
opportunity to fulfill their dreams.
This is where I will begin, but it is not where I will stop. I will
continue this fight until I see every child in school.
Dear brothers and sisters, great people who brought change, like
Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela,Mother Teresa and
Aung San Suu Kyi, once stood here on this stage.
I hope the steps that Kailash Satyarthi and I have taken so far, and
will take on this journey,
will also bring change――lasting change.
My great hope is that this will be the last time we must fight for
education.
Let's solve this once and for all.
We have already taken many steps.Now it is time to take a leap.
It is not time to tell the world leaders to realize how important
education is――
they already know it. Their own children are in good schools. Now it
is time to call them to take action, for the rest of the world's
children.
We ask the world leaders to unite and make education their top
priority.
Fifteen years ago, the world leaders decided on a set of global goals,
the Millennium Development Goals. In the years that have followed, we
have seen some progress.
The number of children out of school has been halved, as Kailash
Satyarthi said.
However, the world focused only on primary education and progress did
not reach everyone.
In the year 2015, representatives from all around the world will
meet in the United Nations to set the next set of goals,
the Sustainable Development Goals. This will set the world's
ambition for the next generations.
The world can no longer accept that basic education is enough.
Why do leaders accept that for children in developing countries
only basic literacy is sufficient,
when their own children do homework in algebra, mathematics,
science and physics?
Leaders must seize this opportunity to guarantee a free, quality,
primary and secondary education for every child.
Some will say this is impractical or too expensive or too hard,
or maybe even impossible.
But it is time the world thinks bigger.
Dear sisters and brothers, the so-called world of adults may
understand it, but we children don't.
Why is it that countries which we call “strong" are so powerful in
creating wars but are so weak in bringing peace?
Why is it that giving guns is so easy but giving books is so hard?
Why is it that making tanks is so easy, but building schools is so
hard?
We are living in the modern age, and we believe that nothing is
impossible.We have reached the Moon,
45 years ago, and maybe we will soon land on Mars. Then, in the 21st
century, we must be able to give every child quality education.
Dear sisters and brothers, dear fellow children, we must work...
and not wait.
Not just the politicians and the world leaders, we all need to
contribute.Me,you,we,it is our duty.
Let us become the first generation to decide to be the last.
Let us become the first generation that decides to be the last that
sees empty classrooms,lost childhoods, wasted potentials.
Let this be the last time that a girl or a boy spends their
childhood ina factory.
Let this be the last time that a girl is forced into early child
marriage.
Let this be the last time that a child loses life in war.
Let this be the last time that we see a child out of school.
Let this end with us.
Let's begin this ending.
Together, today, right here, right now, let's begin this ending now.
Thank you so much.Thank you.