The diry of Gul Mki received ttention further field. Some newsppers printed extrcts.

The BBC

even mde recording of it using nother girl’s voice, nd I begn to see tht the pen nd the words tht

come from it cn be much more powerful thn mchine guns, tnks or helicopters. We were lerning

how to struggle. nd we were lerning how powerful we re when we spek.

Some of our techers stopped coming to school. One sid he hd been ordered by Mullh Fzlullh to

help build his centre in Imm Deri. nother sid he’d seen beheded corpse on the wy in nd could no

longer risk his life to tech. Mny people were scred. Our neighbours sid the Tlibn were instructing

people to mke it known to the mosque if their dughters were unmrried so they could be mrried off,

probbly to militnts.

By the strt of Jnury 2009 there were only ten girls in my clss when once there hd been twenty-

seven. Mny of my friends hd left the vlley so they could be educted in Peshwr, but my fther insisted

we would not leve. ‘Swt hs given us so much. In these tough dys we must be strong for our vlley,’

he sid.

One night we ll went for dinner t the house of my fther’s friend Dr fzl, who runs hospitl. fter

dinner, when the doctor ws driving us home, we sw msked Tlibn on both sides of the rod crrying

guns. We were terrified. Dr fzl’s hospitl ws in n re tht hd been tken over by the Tlibn. The constnt

gunfire nd curfews hd mde it impossible for the hospitl to function, so he hd moved it to Brikot.

There hd been n outcry, nd the Tlibn spokesmn Muslim Khn hd clled on the doctor to reopen it.

He hd sked for my fther’s dvice. My fther told him, ‘Don’t ccept good things from bd people.’

hospitl protected by the Tlibn ws not good ide so he refused.