9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
When I was a child,[br]I knew I had superpowers.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
That's right.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I thought I was absolutely amazing[br]because I could understand

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and relate to the feelings[br]of brown people, like my grandfather,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
a conservative Muslim guy.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And also, I could understand[br]my Afghan mother, my Pakistani father,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
not so religious but[br]laid-back, fairly liberal.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And of course, I could understand[br]and relate to the feelings of white people.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
The white Norwegians of my country.[br]You know, white, brown, whatever,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I loved them all. I understood them all,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
even if they didn't always[br]understand each other,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
they were all my people.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
My father, though,[br]was always really worried.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
He kept saying that[br]even with the best education,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I was not going to get a fair shake.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I would still face discrimination,[br]according to him, and that they only way

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
to be accepted by white people[br]would be to become famous.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Now mind you, he had this conversation[br]with me when I was seven-years-old.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So while I'm seven-years-old,[br]he said, look,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
so its either got to be sports,[br]or its got to be music.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
He didn't know anything about sports --[br]bless him -- so it was music.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So when I was seven-years-old,[br]he gathered all my toys, all my dolls,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and he threw them all away.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
In exchange, he gave me a crappy little[br]Casio keyboard and singing lessons.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
He forced me, basically, to practice[br]for hours and hours every single day.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Very quickly, he also had me performing[br]for larger and larger audiences,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and bizarrely, I became almost[br]a kind of poster child

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
for Norwegian multi-culturalism.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I felt very proud, of course.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Even the newspapers were starting[br]to write nice things about brown people,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
so I could feel that[br]my superpower was growing.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So when I was 12-years-old,[br]walking home from school,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I took a little detour[br]because I wanted to buy

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
my favorite sweets called Salty Feets.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I know they sound kind of awful,[br]but I absolutely love them.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
They're basically these little salty[br]licorice bits in the shape of feet.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And now that I say it out loud,[br]I realize how terrible that sounds,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
but be that as it may,[br]I absolutely love them.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So on my way into the store,[br]there was this grown white guy

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
in the doorway blocking my way.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So I tried to walk around him,[br]and as I did that, he stopped me

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and he was staring at me,[br]and he spit in my face,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and he said, get out of my way[br]you little black bitch,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
you little Paki bitch,[br]go back home where you came from.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I was absolutely horrified.[br]I was staring at him.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I was too afraid to wipe[br]the spit off my face,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
even as it was mixing with my tears.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I remember looking around,[br]hoping that any minute now,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
a grown-up is going to come [br]and make this guy stop.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
But instead, people kept hurrying past me[br]and pretended not to see me.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I was very confused[br]because I was thinking,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
well, my white people, come on![br]Where are they? What's going on?

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
How come they're not[br]coming and rescuing me?

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, needless to say,[br]I didn't buy the sweets.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I just ran home as fast as I could.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Things were still okay, though, I thought.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
As time went on, the more successful[br]I became, I eventually started attracting

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
harassment from brown people.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Some men in my parent's community[br]felt that it was unacceptable

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and dishonorable for a woman[br]to be involved in music

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and to be so present in the media.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So very quickly, I was starting to become[br]attacked at my own concerts.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I remember one of the concerts,[br]I was onstage, I lean into the audience

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and the last thing I see is[br]a young brown face

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and the next thing I know[br]some sort of chemical is thrown in my eyes

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and I remember I couldn't really see[br]and my eyes were watering

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
but I kept singing anyway.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I was spit in the face in the streets[br]of Oslo, this time by brown men.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
They even tried to[br]kidnap me at one point.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
The death threats were endless.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I remember one older bearded guy[br]stopped me in the street one time,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and he said, the reason[br]I hate you so much

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
is because you make[br]our daughters think

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
they can do whatever they want.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
A younger guy warned me[br]to watch my back.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
He said music is un-Islamic[br]and the job of whores,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and if you keep this up,[br]you are going to be raped

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and your stomach will be cut out so that[br]another whore like you will not be born.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Again, I was so confused.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I couldn't understand[br]what was going on.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
My brown people now starting[br]to treat me like this -- how come?

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Instead of bridging the worlds, [br]the two worlds, I felt like I was

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
falling between my two worlds.[br]I suppose for me, spit was kryptonite.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So by the time I was 17-years-old,[br]the death threats were endless

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and the harassment was constant.[br]It got so bad, at one point my mother

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
sat me down and said, look,[br]we can no longer protect you,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
we can no longer keep you safe,[br]so you're going to have to go.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So I bought a one-way ticket to London.[br]I packed my suitcase, and I left.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
My biggest heartbreak at that point[br]was that nobody said anything.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I had a very public exit from Norway.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
My brown people, my white people,[br]nobody said anything.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Nobody said, hold on, this is wrong.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Support this girl, protect this girl[br]because she is one of us.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Nope. Nobody said that.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Instead, I felt like,[br]you know at the airport, on the baggage

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
carousel you have these different[br]suitcases going around and around

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and there's always that one suitcase left[br]at the end, the one that nobody wants,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
the one that nobody comes to claim.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I felt like that. I'd never felt so alone.[br]I'd never felt so lost.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So, after coming to London,[br]I did eventually resume my music career.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Different place but unfortunately[br]the same old story.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I remember a message sent to me[br]saying that I was going to be killed

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
and that rivers of blood were going[br]to flow and that I was going to be raped

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
many times before I died.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
By this point, I have to say,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I was actually getting used[br]to messages like this,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
but what became different was that[br]now they started threatening my family.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So once again, I packed my suitcase,[br]I left music and I moved to the US.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I'd had enough. I didn't want to have[br]anything to do with this anymore.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And I was certainly not[br]going to be killed for something

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
that wasn't even my dream --[br]it was my father's choice.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
So I kind of got lost.[br]I kind of fell apart.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
But I decided that what I wanted to do[br]is spend the next however many years

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
of my life supporting young people[br]and to try to be there in some small way,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
whatever way that I could.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I started volunteering for various[br]organizations that were working

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
with young Muslims inside of Europe.[br]

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
And, to my surprise, what I found[br]was so many of these young people

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
were suffering and struggling.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
They were facing so many problems[br]with their families and their communities

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
who seemed to care more about[br]their honor and their reputation than the

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
happiness and the lives of their own kids.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
I started feeling like maybe I wasn't[br]so alone, maybe I wasn't so weird.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
Maybe there are more of[br]my people out there.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
The thing is, what most people[br]don't understand is that there are so many

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
of us growing up in Europe who[br]are not free to be ourselves.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
We're not allowed to be who we are.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
We are not free to marry or to be in[br]relationships with people that we choose.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
We can't even pick our own career.

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
This is the norm in the[br]Muslim heartlands of Europe,

9:59:59.000,9:59:59.000
even in the freest societies in the world,[br]we're not free.