WEBVTT 00:00:18.953 --> 00:00:23.100 There's a group of people in Kenya, 00:00:23.100 --> 00:00:26.872 people cross oceans to go see them. 00:00:26.872 --> 00:00:35.478 These people are tall, they jump high, they wear red and they kill lions. 00:00:35.478 --> 00:00:38.318 You might be wondering, who are those people? 00:00:38.318 --> 00:00:41.288 These are the Maasais. 00:00:41.288 --> 00:00:43.204 And you know what's cool? 00:00:43.204 --> 00:00:47.317 I'm actually one of them. (Laughter) 00:00:47.317 --> 00:00:51.384 The Maasais, the boys are brought up to be warriors, 00:00:51.384 --> 00:00:55.129 the girls are brought up to be mothers. 00:00:55.129 --> 00:01:00.176 When I was five years old, I found out that I was engaged, 00:01:00.176 --> 00:01:03.069 to be married as soon as I reach puberty. 00:01:03.069 --> 00:01:05.846 My mother, my grandmother, my aunties, 00:01:05.846 --> 00:01:11.310 they constantly reminded me that, "Your husband just passed by." 00:01:11.310 --> 00:01:14.857 (Laughter) Cool, yeah? 00:01:16.169 --> 00:01:19.250 And everything I had to do from that moment 00:01:19.250 --> 00:01:24.758 was to prepare me to be a perfect woman at the age of 12. 00:01:24.758 --> 00:01:27.289 My day started at five in the morning, 00:01:27.289 --> 00:01:30.405 milking the cows, sweeping the house, cooking for my siblings, 00:01:30.405 --> 00:01:34.968 collecting water, fire wood. 00:01:34.968 --> 00:01:41.858 I did everything that I needed to do, to become a perfect wife 00:01:41.858 --> 00:01:47.843 I went to school not because the Maasai women all go to school. 00:01:47.843 --> 00:01:51.307 It's because my mother was denied an eduction 00:01:51.307 --> 00:01:54.742 and she constantly reminded me and my siblings that, 00:01:54.742 --> 00:01:58.913 she never wanted us to live the life she was living. 00:01:58.913 --> 00:02:00.881 Why did she say that? 00:02:00.881 --> 00:02:05.770 My father worked as a policemen in the city, 00:02:05.770 --> 00:02:11.393 he came home once a year, we didn't see him for sometimes even 2 years. 00:02:11.393 --> 00:02:14.932 And whenever he came home, it was a different case. 00:02:14.932 --> 00:02:20.037 My mother worked hard in the farm to grow crop so that we can eat, 00:02:20.037 --> 00:02:24.141 she read the cows and the goats so that she can care for us. 00:02:24.141 --> 00:02:26.805 But when my father came, he would sell the cows, 00:02:26.805 --> 00:02:29.102 he would sell the products we had 00:02:29.102 --> 00:02:33.418 and he went and drank with his friends in the bars. 00:02:33.418 --> 00:02:37.912 Becasue my mother a women, she was not allowed to own any property 00:02:37.912 --> 00:02:39.831 and by default everything in my family, 00:02:39.831 --> 00:02:43.406 anyway, belonged to my father so he had the right. 00:02:43.406 --> 00:02:47.801 And if my mother ever questioned him, he'd beat her, abused her 00:02:47.801 --> 00:02:52.245 and really, it was difficult. 00:02:52.245 --> 00:02:57.422 When I went to school, I had a dream, I wanted to become a teacher. 00:02:57.422 --> 00:03:01.513 Teachers looked nice, they wear nice dresses, high-heeled shoes -- 00:03:01.513 --> 00:03:04.662 I found later that they were uncomfortable, but I admired it. 00:03:04.662 --> 00:03:07.788 (Laughter) 00:03:07.788 --> 00:03:12.089 But most of all, the teacher was just writing on the board -- 00:03:12.089 --> 00:03:14.514 not hard work, that's what I thought, 00:03:14.514 --> 00:03:19.663 compared to what I was doing at the farm, so I wanted to become a teacher. 00:03:19.663 --> 00:03:23.634 I worked hard in school, but when I was an eight grader, 00:03:23.634 --> 00:03:25.763 it was a determining factor. 00:03:25.763 --> 00:03:30.841 In our tradition, there's a ceremony that girls have to undergo to become a woman. 00:03:30.841 --> 00:03:34.026 And it's a right of passage to womanhood. 00:03:34.026 --> 00:03:37.152 And then I was just finishing my eight grade 00:03:37.152 --> 00:03:39.618 and that was a transition for me to go to higschool, 00:03:39.618 --> 00:03:41.375 this was the crossroad. 00:03:41.375 --> 00:03:46.890 Once I go through this tradtion I was going to become a wife. 00:03:46.890 --> 00:03:51.125 Well, my dream of becoming a teacher will not come to pass. 00:03:51.125 --> 00:03:56.330 So I had to come up with a plan to figure these things out. 00:03:56.330 --> 00:04:00.265 I talked to my father, I did something that most girls have never done. 00:04:00.265 --> 00:04:06.248 I told my father, I will only go through this ceremony if you'l let me go back to school. 00:04:06.248 --> 00:04:12.181 The reason why, if I ran away, my father will have a stigma, people will be calling him, 00:04:12.181 --> 00:04:15.185 "The father of that girl who didn't go through the ceremony." 00:04:15.185 --> 00:04:19.327 It was a shameful thing for him to carry the rest of his life. 00:04:19.327 --> 00:04:25.262 So he figured out -- well, he said, "OK, you'll go to school after the ceremony." 00:04:25.262 --> 00:04:31.636 I did. The ceremony happenned, it's a whole week long of excitments. 00:04:31.636 --> 00:04:33.871 It's a ceremony, people are enjoying. 00:04:33.871 --> 00:04:36.788 And the day before the actual ceremony happens, 00:04:36.788 --> 00:04:42.820 we were dancing, having exceitments and through all the night, we did not sleep -- 00:04:42.820 --> 00:04:46.452 The actual day came and we walked out of the house 00:04:46.452 --> 00:04:47.856 and we were dancing, 00:04:47.856 --> 00:04:50.416 as we danced and danced and we walked out of the courtyard 00:04:50.416 --> 00:04:54.738 and there were a bunch of people waiting, they were all in a circle. 00:04:54.738 --> 00:04:59.863 And as we dance and dance, and we approach this circle of women -- 00:04:59.863 --> 00:05:02.415 men, women, children everybody was there. 00:05:02.415 --> 00:05:05.307 There was a women sitting in the middle of it 00:05:05.307 --> 00:05:09.870 and this women was waiting to hold us, 00:05:09.870 --> 00:05:13.787 and I was the first, there were my sisters and a couple of other girls. 00:05:13.787 --> 00:05:23.195 As I approach her, she looked at me and I sat down and I opened my legs. 00:05:23.195 --> 00:05:30.427 As I opened my leg, another women came, and this women was carrying a knife. 00:05:30.427 --> 00:05:38.570 And a she carried the knife she walked towards me, and she held my clitoris, and she cut it off. 00:05:38.570 --> 00:05:43.477 As you can imagine, I bled. I bled. 00:05:43.477 --> 00:05:48.400 After bleeding for a while, I fainted there after. 00:05:48.400 --> 00:05:54.619 It's something that so many girls -- I'm lucky I never died, but many die. 00:05:54.619 --> 00:06:00.821 It's practice with no anaesthesia, it's a rusty old knife 00:06:00.821 --> 00:06:03.820 and it was difficult. 00:06:03.820 --> 00:06:09.433 I was lucky because one -- also, my mom did something that most women don't do 00:06:09.433 --> 00:06:12.266 three days later, after everybody has left the home 00:06:12.266 --> 00:06:14.243 my mom went and brought a nurse. 00:06:14.243 --> 00:06:20.518 We were taken care of, three weeks later I was healed and I was back in high school. 00:06:20.518 --> 00:06:24.186 I was so determined to be a teacher now 00:06:24.186 --> 00:06:27.960 so that I can make a difference in my family. 00:06:27.960 --> 00:06:31.554 Well, while I was in high school, something happened, 00:06:31.554 --> 00:06:37.017 I met another young gentlemen from our village who had been to the university of Oregon. 00:06:37.017 --> 00:06:43.589 This man was wearing a white T-shirt, jeans, a camera, 00:06:43.589 --> 00:06:46.001 white sneakers -- and I'm talking about white sneakers. 00:06:46.001 --> 00:06:50.444 There's something about clothes I think and shoes. (Laughter) 00:06:50.444 --> 00:06:55.469 And this was in a village that didn't even have paved roads, 00:06:55.469 --> 00:06:58.329 it was quite attractive. (Laughter) 00:06:58.329 --> 00:07:04.544 I told him, "I want to go to where you are," because this man looked very happy 00:07:04.544 --> 00:07:06.888 and I admired that. 00:07:06.888 --> 00:07:08.131 And he told me, 00:07:08.131 --> 00:07:12.763 "Well, what do you mean you want to go, don't you have a husband waiting for you?" 00:07:12.763 --> 00:07:18.775 And I told him, "Don't worry about that part, just tell me how to get there." 00:07:18.775 --> 00:07:21.205 This gentlemen, he helped me. 00:07:21.205 --> 00:07:25.245 While I was in school also, my dad was sick, he got a stroke -- 00:07:25.245 --> 00:07:30.522 and he was really sick so he really couldn't tell me what to do next. 00:07:30.522 --> 00:07:34.282 But the problem is my father is not the only father I have. 00:07:34.282 --> 00:07:39.261 Everybody who is my dad's age, male, in the community, is my father by default. 00:07:39.261 --> 00:07:44.374 My uncles, all of them, they dictate what my future is. 00:07:44.374 --> 00:07:46.631 So the news came, and I applied to school 00:07:46.631 --> 00:07:51.570 and I was accepted to Randolph-Macon Woman's College, In Lynchburg, Virginia 00:07:51.570 --> 00:07:55.053 and I couldn't come without the support of the village 00:07:55.053 --> 00:07:57.362 because I needed to raise money to buy the air ticket. 00:07:57.362 --> 00:08:00.990 I got a scholarship, but I needed to get myself here. 00:08:00.990 --> 00:08:03.576 But I needed the support of the village 00:08:03.576 --> 00:08:07.903 and here again, when the men, the people heard 00:08:07.903 --> 00:08:10.926 that a women had gotten an opportunity to go to school 00:08:10.926 --> 00:08:13.251 they said, "What a lost opportunity, 00:08:13.251 --> 00:08:16.883 this should have been given to a boy we can't do this." 00:08:16.883 --> 00:08:21.774 So I went back, and I had to go back to the tradition. 00:08:21.794 --> 00:08:26.936 There's a belief among our people that morning brings good news. 00:08:26.936 --> 00:08:29.647 So, I had I to come up with something to do with the morning 00:08:29.647 --> 00:08:32.579 because there's good news in the morning. 00:08:32.579 --> 00:08:37.912 And in the village also there's one chief or person, male, an elder 00:08:37.912 --> 00:08:41.347 if he says "Yes,"everybody will follow him. 00:08:41.347 --> 00:08:45.160 So I went to him, very early in the morning, as the sun had rised, 00:08:45.160 --> 00:08:49.125 the first thing that he sees when he opens his door is me. 00:08:49.125 --> 00:08:51.361 "My child, what are you doing here?" 00:08:51.361 --> 00:08:55.698 "Well Dad, I need help, can you support me to go to America?" 00:08:55.698 --> 00:08:59.466 I promised him that I'll be the best girl, I will come back 00:08:59.466 --> 00:09:03.643 anything they wanted after that, I will do it for them. 00:09:03.643 --> 00:09:05.399 He said, "Well, but I can't do it alone." 00:09:05.399 --> 00:09:10.643 He gave me a list of other 15 men that I went, 16 more men. 00:09:10.643 --> 00:09:13.942 Every single morning I went and visited them. 00:09:13.942 --> 00:09:17.424 They all came together -- the village, the women, the men. 00:09:17.424 --> 00:09:22.080 Everybody came together to support me to come, to get an education. 00:09:22.080 --> 00:09:25.766 I arrived in America, as you can imagine, what did I find? 00:09:25.766 --> 00:09:29.955 (Laughter) I found snow, 00:09:29.955 --> 00:09:31.690 I found Walmart, 00:09:31.690 --> 00:09:36.306 vacuum cleaners and lots of food in the cafeteria. 00:09:36.306 --> 00:09:41.930 I was in a land of plenty. I enjoyed myself, 00:09:41.930 --> 00:09:47.227 but during that moment while I was here, I discovered a lot of things 00:09:47.227 --> 00:09:52.520 I learned that, that ceremony that I went through when I was 13 years old 00:09:52.520 --> 00:09:55.790 was called female genital mutilation. 00:09:55.790 --> 00:09:59.282 I learned that it was against the law in Kenya, 00:09:59.282 --> 00:10:04.048 I learned that, I did not have to trade part of my body 00:10:04.063 --> 00:10:07.158 to get and eduction, I had a right! 00:10:07.158 --> 00:10:11.411 And as we speak right now, three million girls in Africa 00:10:11.411 --> 00:10:15.677 are at risk of undergoing through this mutilation. 00:10:15.677 --> 00:10:19.144 I learned that my mom had a right to own property, 00:10:19.144 --> 00:10:24.726 I learned that did not have to abused because she was a women. 00:10:24.726 --> 00:10:27.863 Those things made me angry. 00:10:27.863 --> 00:10:29.861 I wanted to do something. 00:10:29.861 --> 00:10:35.061 Every time I went back, I found that my neighbours' girls 00:10:35.061 --> 00:10:36.532 were getting married, they were getting mutilated. 00:10:36.532 --> 00:10:42.072 And after I graduated from here, I worked at the UN, I went back to school 00:10:42.072 --> 00:10:47.740 to get my graduate work, the constant cry of these girls was on my face. 00:10:47.740 --> 00:10:50.360 I had to do something. 00:10:50.360 --> 00:10:54.451 As I went back, I started talking to the men, to the village, and mothers and I said, 00:10:54.451 --> 00:10:58.527 "I wanna give back the way I had promised you that I would come back and help you. 00:10:58.527 --> 00:10:59.774 What do you need?" 00:10:59.774 --> 00:11:01.622 As I spoke to the women, they told me, 00:11:01.622 --> 00:11:03.923 "You know what we need? We really need a school for girls 00:11:03.923 --> 00:11:06.348 because there has not been any school for girls." 00:11:06.348 --> 00:11:08.232 And the reason they wanted the school for girls 00:11:08.232 --> 00:11:11.836 is because when a girl is raped when she's walking to school 00:11:11.836 --> 00:11:13.972 the mother is blamed for that. 00:11:13.972 --> 00:11:17.850 If she got pregnant before she got married, 00:11:17.850 --> 00:11:21.497 the mother is blamed for that and she's punished, she's beaten. 00:11:21.497 --> 00:11:25.300 They said, "We wanted to put our girls in a safe place." 00:11:25.300 --> 00:11:27.962 As we moved, and I went to talk to the fathers, 00:11:27.962 --> 00:11:30.555 he fathers of course, you can imagine what they said, 00:11:30.555 --> 00:11:32.942 "We want a school for boys." 00:11:32.942 --> 00:11:37.685 And I said, well, there are a couple of many men from my village who had been out 00:11:37.685 --> 00:11:39.316 and they've got an education 00:11:39.316 --> 00:11:43.585 why can't they build a school for boys and I'll build a school for girls? 00:11:43.585 --> 00:11:46.755 That made sens and they agreed. 00:11:46.755 --> 00:11:51.861 And I told them, I wanted them to show me a sign of commitment 00:11:51.861 --> 00:11:53.191 and they did. 00:11:53.191 --> 00:11:57.855 They donated land where we build the girls' school, we have. 00:11:57.855 --> 00:12:00.926 I want you to meet one of the girls in that school. 00:12:00.926 --> 00:12:03.691 Angelene came to apply for the school 00:12:03.691 --> 00:12:07.133 and she did not meet any criterias that we had. 00:12:07.133 --> 00:12:10.146 She's an orphan, yes. We could have taken her for that, 00:12:10.146 --> 00:12:15.848 but she was 12 years old and we were taking in girls who were in the fourth grade. 00:12:15.848 --> 00:12:18.957 Everybody were telling us Angelene had been moving from one place, 00:12:18.957 --> 00:12:21.373 because she's an orphan, she has no mother, she has no father, 00:12:21.373 --> 00:12:23.358 moving from one grandmother's house to another one 00:12:23.358 --> 00:12:27.460 from aunties to aunties, she had no stability in her life. 00:12:27.460 --> 00:12:30.837 And people said, and I looked at her I rememberd that day, 00:12:30.837 --> 00:12:35.689 and I saw something beyond what I was seeing in Angelene 00:12:35.689 --> 00:12:38.364 and yes she was older to be in fourth grade, 00:12:38.364 --> 00:12:41.219 we gave her the opportunity to come the class. 00:12:41.219 --> 00:12:44.380 Five months later, there is Angelene. 00:12:44.380 --> 00:12:47.148 A transformation had begun in her life 00:12:47.148 --> 00:12:52.550 Angelene wants to be a pilot so she can fly around the world and do a difference. 00:12:52.550 --> 00:12:54.694 She was not the top student when we took her, 00:12:54.694 --> 00:12:57.279 now she's the best student not just in our school, 00:12:57.279 --> 00:13:00.145 but in the entire division that we are in. 00:13:00.145 --> 00:13:04.225 She's showing different, that's Sharon, that's five years later, 00:13:04.225 --> 00:13:09.871 that's Avaleen, five months later, that's the difference that we are making 00:13:09.871 --> 00:13:12.984 As a new dawn is happening in my school 00:13:12.984 --> 00:13:15.460 A new beginning is happening, 00:13:15.460 --> 00:13:21.466 as we speak right now 125 girls will never be mutilated. 00:13:21.466 --> 00:13:26.691 125 girls will not be married when they are 12 years old. 00:13:26.691 --> 00:13:32.526 125 girls are creating and achieving their dreams. 00:13:32.526 --> 00:13:38.233 This is the thing that we are doing - giving them opportunities so they can rise. 00:13:38.233 --> 00:13:42.141 As we speak right now, women are not being beaten 00:13:42.141 --> 00:13:45.183 because of the revolutions we've started in our community. 00:13:45.183 --> 00:13:53.754 (Applause) 00:13:53.754 --> 00:13:56.250 I want to challenge you today 00:13:56.250 --> 00:14:01.452 you're listening to me because you are here very optimistic. 00:14:01.452 --> 00:14:04.990 You are somebody who is so passionate 00:14:04.990 --> 00:14:08.730 You are somebody who wants to see a better world. 00:14:08.730 --> 00:14:11.933 You are somebody who wants to see the war end. 00:14:11.933 --> 00:14:13.201 No poverty. 00:14:13.201 --> 00:14:15.837 You are somebody who wants to make a difference. 00:14:15.837 --> 00:14:19.441 You are somebody who wants to make our tomorrow better. 00:14:19.441 --> 00:14:23.426 I want to challenge today to be there first -- 00:14:23.426 --> 00:14:25.729 because people will follow you. 00:14:25.729 --> 00:14:27.964 Be the first - people will follow you 00:14:27.964 --> 00:14:30.696 Be bold - standup. 00:14:30.696 --> 00:14:32.003 Be fearless. 00:14:32.003 --> 00:14:33.561 Be confident. 00:14:33.561 --> 00:14:38.802 Move out because as you change your world, as you change your community, 00:14:38.802 --> 00:14:43.611 as we believe we are impacting one girl, one family, 00:14:43.611 --> 00:14:46.950 one village, one country at a time. 00:14:46.950 --> 00:14:48.219 We are making a difference. 00:14:48.219 --> 00:14:52.114 So if you change your world, you're going to change your community, 00:14:52.114 --> 00:14:53.976 you're going to change your country. 00:14:53.976 --> 00:14:57.321 And think about that, if you do that and I do that, 00:14:57.321 --> 00:14:59.200 ain't we going to create a better future, 00:14:59.200 --> 00:15:02.520 for our children, for your children, for our grandchildren, 00:15:02.521 --> 00:15:05.346 and we will live in a very peaceful world. 00:15:05.346 --> 00:15:06.598 Thank you very much. 00:15:06.598 --> 00:15:25.050 (Applause)