Women In Our Lives: An anthology

Soumaya El Haffari, 14, Rabat.

The Woman Who Never Gave Up Since the beginning of time, all over the world, women have been an essential element in all kinds of domains, whether social, religious, political or scientific. Women have an effect on everyone’s lives. She can be the darling wife, the perfect mother, the sincere sister or the best friend. A woman is an important person in each house as she has a great impact on people, on their personalities, characters, attitudes and beliefs. For me, the woman who had an impact on my life was my mother. She raised me in, what I consider to be, a perfect way, although she was not educated. One might say that there are a thousand uneducated women who raised their children properly. But this is a different case.

My mom did not have an easy childhood. She was denied many things, most importantly, the right to go to school. My grandparents had a wrong belief, they thought that girls should just stay at home, help in the kitchen, clean, cook and do chores. While her brothers went to school, my mom was forced to stay behind. She did not agree with this thinking, so she used to take her brothers’ pens and papers to try and teach herself to write and read. However, she found this quite difficult and instead started drawing what she loved most: clothes. She promised herself that one day, when she will grow up, she would study and follow her dream to become a fashion designer.

One day, she got the opportunity to leave her small town and move to a big city. There she started going to school, even though she had become an adult. She had to raise her young children and study at the same time. She stayed up late and did her best, all while caring for my siblings and me. After she finished her studies, she went a step further on the way to achieve her dream. So, 67