My mother named me after a miracle of nature: Waris means desert flower. The desert flower blooms in a barren environment where few living things can survive.
Women’s loyalty has to be earned with trust and affection, rather than barbaric rituals. The time has come to leave the old ways of suffering behind.
Mama tied a blindfold over my eyes. The next thing I felt my flesh was being cut away. I heard the blade sawing back and forth through my skin. The pain between my legs was so intense I wished I would die.
Every day, women move mountains. It is an insult to have an international women’s day.
I love the truth. Tell the truth and live the truth, because we’ve seen enough lies and look what it’s doing.
Sometimes I wonder where I am from. I am either way ahead or I come from another world. I don’t recognise this world.
Female genital mutilation targets little girls, baby girls – fragile angels who are helpless, who cannot fight back. It’s a crime against a child, a crime against humanity. It’s abuse. It’s absolutely criminal and we have to stop it.
Because women and girls are not valued equally as human beings, they are treated as less than such. Female genital mutilation is one example of this that has to be stopped.
I love life. I wish I could live another 500 years, truly. There is so much to do. I don’t feel bitter or angry or disappointed. If anything, I am very grateful for where I come from. I have absolutely no regrets.
Don’t do to your daughters what has been done to you! They are perfect and beautiful.
I still do find it very difficult in the West to connect to this politeness of smiling, not saying how you’re thinking or not saying how you really feel.
I don’t know what a supermodel is. If they call me that, I might have to punch them. It’s just so vain and so unreal.
Laws are important. But they can only be effective if the people know about the particular laws.
I belong nowhere and to no one.
FGM breaches all human rights and has no place in any 21st century society.
I’ve never been one to stay still. I was born a nomad, and I still am a nomad and always will be.
Personal style? I don’t really believe in that. Whatever is comfortable.
Brooklyn’s good. Brooklyn’s funky. Brooklyn’s happening.
The people celebrate with our traditional dancing: the women clapping their hands and chanting, their low sweet voices humming across the desert night, and the men leaping high into the air. Everyone contributes food, and we eat.
When the shows begin in Milan for the season, every woman and girl in modeling heads there, along with every woman and girl who’s ever dreamed of becoming a model. Suddenly the city is mobbed by extremely tall mutant women, running everywhere like ants.