WEBVTT

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My name is Michaela DePrince.

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When I first started to write my speech,

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I thought, maybe, I could give it
a fairytale kind of twist.

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But only because most people
tell me that my life is a fairytale.

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But I have to say I strongly disagree.

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Yes, I got what I've always dreamed of,
but I have to fight for it.

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I wasn't always called Michaela DePrince.

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My original name is Mabinty Bangura,

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and I was born in Sierra Leone,
West Africa in 1995,

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four years after the bloody civil war.

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This war would displace thousands of men,

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it would cause thousands of women
and children to be raped,

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and over 50,000 people would be killed.

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My parents were among them.

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I was born with vitiligo,
a skin condition.

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It left white patches all over my body.

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I was different.

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In Sierra Leone, they didn't understand

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the fact that just because I had
white patches on my skin,

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that I was just born this way,

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they thought I was a curse.

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They started to call me
"the devil's child,"

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because anybody who would look like this
would be the child of the devil.

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I was ridiculed and harassed,

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because I looked different.

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My parents tried to defend me
as much as they could,

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but they understood
I'd never get married

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because of the way I looked.

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They tried to educate me,
they taught me to read,

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and they started to save
money for my education.

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But when my parents passed away,
I was defenseless and alone.

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I've never been so scared in my life.

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My uncle took me to the orphanage,

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knowing that he could never get
a good price for me as a bride,

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and never came back for me.

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In the orphanage
we were taken care of by aunties,

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not like the aunties you have at home,
the aunties who love you.

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They care about you
no matter what you do.

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These aunties were uneducated women,

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who only take care us to bring
food home for their kids.

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They would wash our clothes
and give us food.

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But these aunties had their favorites.

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There were 27 kids in the orphanage.

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Number 1 got the biggest portion
of food and the first choice of clothes.

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Number 27 got the smallest portion
of food and the last choice of clothes.

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I was number 27.

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Everyday in the orphanage,
I was starving.

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I have never felt so alone before.

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How could this happen to me?

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This is when I realized it was much easier
to not care about anybody

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because they always ended up leaving me.

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But then I made a friend in the orphanage.

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Her name was Mabinty, Mabinty Suma.

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Number 26 was always in ill health,
sick, but she always had a kind heart.

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And she was always [full of good cheer].

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Number 26 would always listen
to all my fears, and all my dreams.

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Whenever I was scared,
she would sing to me.

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When I couldn't fall asleep,
she would tell me a bedtime story.

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And Number 26 is still doing that
15 years later, as my sister Mia.

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And one day,

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the big wind threw a magazine
right onto the gate at the orphanage.

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I reached out, and I grabbed it.


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And I saw something.

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This amazing creature, this person
I have never seen before,

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she is on her tippytoes,
and in this beautiful pink costume.

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But what really struck me the most
was the fact that she looked so happy.

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I hadn't been happy in a long time.

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So I thought to myself, if she is happy
because this is what she is doing,

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then, maybe, I could be happy too someday.

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I had to be this person, I just had to be,

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in order to become something.

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So I ripped the cover off the magazine,
and put it in my underwear

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because I had nowhere else to put it.

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Because as number 27,
I didn't have anything to do,

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they would never give me 
toys or any clothes,

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so where else could I put it?

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And then, a teacher came
to the orphanage to teach us English.

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She was also pregnant at that time.

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I showed teacher Sarah the magazine cover,

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and she explained to me
this person was dancing ballet.

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She was a ballerina.

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I was going to be this ballerina,
I just had to be.

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I'd always go onto my tippytoes everyday
and practice just like the ballerina.

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I thought, maybe, one day,
with everything going so well,

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I finally had somebody who cared about me,

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maybe one day I could be this ballerina.

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Teacher Sarah cared about me so much,

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and she knew how important it was
for me to get a good education,

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so she would always give me extra lessons.

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After a few extra lessons, teacher Sarah
and I started to walk towards the gate.

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Me twirling around, trying to be
the ballerina on the magazine.

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And all of a sudden,
two rebels come towards the gate,

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[with] a little rebel lagging behind them.

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And around the corner,
a truck full of them.

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They were laughing and cheering.

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They must have been drinking a lot
or under some type of drug.

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And they saw us.

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They saw that teacher Sarah was pregnant.

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They started betting on
whether or not it was a girl or a boy.

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And so they decided to find out.

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They took their machetes out 
and cut her stomach.

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It was a baby girl.

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If it was a boy, 
maybe she would have lived

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because they would taught him
to become a rebel when he was older.

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But it was a girl, so they cut
her arms and legs off in front of me,

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and I tried to go save her
so I went underneath the gate.

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The little boy thought
he should try to copy the older rebels.

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He took his machete out
and cut my stomach.

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Now that you've heard my story,
the beginning of my life,

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do you think it's a fairytale?

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But soon, my life would turn around.

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Soon, I would have positivity in my life.

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I would find out I was going to be adopted
by an American family.

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It took me a while
to get to my adopted family.

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We had to walk, all the orphanages,
all the orphan kids had to walk

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from Makeni, Sierra Leone,
all the way to Guinea,

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and from Guinea
we took a plane to [Accra, Ghana].

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I was very sick when I got off the plane,
and just miserable, and you know...

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How could my life get any better?

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I was a devil's child; of course
nothing good could happen to me.

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And also I was miserable because I thought
I would never see my best friend again.

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But then I saw her,
the lady in the bright red shoes.

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With the bright white, white, white hair;
I have never seen anything like it before.

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She was my new mamma.

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She reached out and said,
"I'm your new mamma."

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She grabbed my hand,
and my best friend's hand,

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and walked us away.

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I was getting adopted with my best friend.

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We got to the hotel,

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and once my mum put her luggage down,
I looked through everything,

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I looked through every nook and cranny

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trying to find my pointe shoes,
my tiara, and my tutu,

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because isn't that
what always happens in a fairytale?

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But they weren't there.

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I didn't speak any English,

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so I thought the only way I could show her
was to show her the magazine.

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I took it out of my underwear,
and I showed her,

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and she understood right away.

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She said: "You will dance."

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When I got to the U.S.,
I started taking ballet classes.

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My mum drove me every single day.

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Except before my first ballet class,

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I was so scared to show my spots
for the kids to make fun of me.

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I begged my mamma to please buy me 
a leotard to hide all my spots.

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It was a long sleeved leotard
that went all the way up to my neck.

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It was so hot in it
she had to take it off right away.

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And I put on
my pink leotards and tights.

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I went to class once a week, twice a week,

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and then, eventually,
by the time I was 10 years old,

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I was dancing five times a week.

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I worked as hard as I possibly could
because I had to be this ballerina;

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it was the only way for me to be happy.

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But while I was working hard,
I lost somebody.

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I lost my 24-year-old brother, Teddy.

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He was the person who made me
be able to trust men again,

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to not be scared of black men
who were shouting,

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to not be scared of men in general,
to not be scared of my own father.

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And again, this is what always happens
when I care about people.

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They always die and leave me.

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I decided to push my family away

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because if they died and left me
I don't know what I could do.

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I didn't want them to die
because I cared about them.

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But my parents were able to convince me

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that even though the people
I love may die,

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their love will always stay with me.

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Their love is a part of who I am today.

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I worked hard for many, many years.
and then, finally, my hard work paid off.

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I got accepted
into a professional ballet company.

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I had become the ballerina
that I've always dreamed of.

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I couldn't believe it.

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How could this happen to me?
Again, I was the devil's child.

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With all this hard work going on,

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I didn't think that any dream
like this could ever come true.

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I was very happy, finally. For once.

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But the reason why I am here today,
the reason why I am telling you my story

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is because I want to encourage
young people to aspire to dream.

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I want people to understand

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that it is OK to be different,
it is OK to stand out.

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I'm different.

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And I want you to understand
to believe in yourself,

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to believe that you have talent
even if you don't think you do.

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No matter what circumstances
you are under,

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no matter how poor, or how sad
you are at any given moment,

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believe.

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And dare to dream.
Dare to push boundaries.

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Dare to be different, dare
to stand out, and all above.

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And last but not least,
don't be afraid of living and loving.

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And this is how I express myself.

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(Ballet dancing)

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(Applause)