Who Am I?

I am a dreamer. I am a visionary. I am aspiring. I am a fighter. I am determined. I am an achiever. I am independent-minded. I am free-spirited. I am fearless. I am defiant. I am a rule-breaker. I am unyielding. I am a history-maker. I am a legend. I am a girl. And I am an Afghan girl.

I am in a battle. A battle with myself, deep inside me. I do not want to hear or see that my present and my future are going to be forced into darkness by them. I do not want to change my choices, my beliefs, or who I am according to their criteria, just so I can have an easier and calmer life. But I cannot. And I will not. Five years have passed, and I am still in the flashes of fire of my wants and dreams.

I am also in a battle outside myself. A battle with a world that is trying to censor me, to push me out of public life and reduce my world to serving others.

Every time I hear the news that a girl has been arrested, it gives me a sense of fear. I get scared. Of course I do. But when I look around, I see that this has slowly become normal for people. A girl can be treated with cruelty in front of their eyes, without even being questioned about what she has done, and people can remain calm. They can easily say, "She should not come out." Or, "If someone knows her, it will be a bad sign for the name of her family." Step by step, it becomes easier for people to accept it. It becomes a kind of habit. Cruelty starts to take the color of normality.

And perhaps the most painful thing is that girls and women themselves are being made to carry a sense of humility, shame, and guilt — as if they are truly guilty. But guilty of what? What exactly have we done? We are only trying to build a future for ourselves. A future for our country. We are not only fighting for our own future; we are fighting for the future of the country too.

"WE ARE NOT WHO THEY ARE TRYING TO MAKE US. WE ARE WHO WE ARE TRYING TO BECOME."

There are many others who try to use our names and our rights, claiming that they are supporting us. But behind the scenes, some of them are no different from those they claim to oppose. Their claims do not speak for us, and their words do not make our rights theirs to represent.

And I am not going to ask them to fight for my rights. This is me. I will do it. And I will continue doing it until I take what is mine.

And that will be my victory. And that will be their failure.