雙語暢銷書《我是馬拉拉》第3章15:遊樂場

I had the run of the school as my playground. My father tells me even before I could talk I would toddle into classes and talk as if I was a teacher. Some of the female staff like Miss Ulfat would pick me up and put me on their lap as if I was their pet or even take me home with them for a while. When I was three or four I was placed in classes for much older children. I used to sit in wonder, listening to everything they were being taught. Sometimes I would mimic the teachers. You could say I grew up in a school.

學校就像是我的遊樂場，我可以自由進出。父親告訴我，在我還不會講話時，就會搖搖晃晃地走進教室裏，咿呀發音，假裝自己是一位老師。有些女老師，例如烏爾法小姐，經常把我抱起來，放在她的腿上，好像我是她的寵物一樣。女老師們有時甚至會把我帶回她們家裏照顧。三四歲的時候，我被安排進一個學生年紀都比我大許多的班級裏。我坐在那裏，好奇地聽着他們在學些什麼。有時候，我會模仿老師說的話。我真的是一個在學校里長大的孩子。

As my father had found with Naeem, it is not easy to mix business and friendship. Eventually Hidayatullah left to start his own school and they divided the students, each taking two of the four years. They did not tell their pupils as they wanted people to think the school was expanding and had two buildings. Though Hidayatullah and my father were not speaking at that time, Hidayatullah missed me so much he used to visit me.

父親跟納伊姆合資辦學，工作和友情交雜在一起，兩人都十分辛苦。最後，希達亞圖拉也離開了，開辦了自己的學校。他們將學生人數分成兩半，一人擁有兩個年級的學生。他們並沒有把這些告訴學生們，而是讓大家以爲學校擴校了，有了兩棟建築。雖然那時希達亞圖拉已經不跟我父親交談了，他仍會因爲想念我而回來探望我。

It was while he was visiting one afternoon in September 2001 that there was a great commotion and other people started arriving. They said there had been a big attack on a building in New York. Two planes had flown into it. I was only four and too young to understand. Even for the adults it was hard to imagine – the biggest buildings in Swat are the hospital and a hotel, which are two or three storeys. It seemed very far away. I had no idea what New York and America were. The school was my world and my world was the school. We did not realise then that 9/11 would change our world too, and would bring war into our valley.

2001年9月的某天下午，他回來看我，一件大事發生了，不斷有人來到家裏。他們說紐約一棟大樓遭到很嚴重的攻擊，兩架飛機直接撞進建築物裏。我當時才四歲，還不懂到底發生了什麼。這件事甚至對於大人們來說，也很難想象--斯瓦特最大的建築就是醫院和旅館，也都不過兩三層樓高。那起事件似乎離我們非常遙遠。我完全不知道紐約和美國是什麼模樣。學校就是我的全世界，我的全世界就是那所學校。我們當時不會想到，9.11事件也會改變我們的世界，並將戰爭帶進我們的河谷。