In the jeep today, I listened to Nujood Ali's story, "I Am Nujood, Age 10 and Divorced." What a remarkable girl.
She is the first one to break down the door; showing a different way.
She is trying to get the laws of Yemen changed...for it to be illegal to marry before 18. At the time of the book, the law hadn't been embraced by the leader of her country....
What you hear is a little girl caught up in a grown-up world far beyond her years of comprehension and without family who dared or moved to help her. In fact, it was her father who married her to an older man....and she but 9 or 10. (She doesn't have papers to know her real age or birthday.)
After she was granted a divorce, two other little girls, ages 9 and 10 also got divorces.
Imagine???
She often drew a house with beautiful windows. When asked about the home she dreamed of....It was a home for girls like her. A place for them to go to escape family. A House of Joy!
It goes to show what great change one person can achieve, if they dare to buck the system.
In 2008, she was only 10 years old....today she is near 18. Her goal was to become a lawyer to help other little girls like herself and to Never Get Married, ever!
I wonder where she is today and what turns and roads her life has taken.
I almost, ALMOST, respect these men who openly marry to perform sexual abuse, for they are doing it in plain view. I said, "almost". And how tragic that the grown women in her life, did nothing to help her, but to say, "This is what the life of women is in Yemen, for generations...to suffer in silence for the sake of family honor."
She didn't even know what "Honor" meant. Or, how her suffering would be good for her father and her family name.
I got that.
How the family honor is upheld as long as we suffer in silence.
Nevermind, that the honor wasn't there to begin with.
All it takes for changes to happen, is for someone to dare to be different!
Go Nujood! I hope you are following you life intentions....and that you will be a lawyer and have a house of Joy, for the little girls who have lost their childhood.
When she was divorced, she wanted toys and candy.
