When someone takes away your pens you realise quite how important education is.

My father used to say the people of Swat and the teachers would continue to educate our children until the last room, the last teacher and the last student was alive. My parents never once suggested I should withdraw from school, ever. Though we loved school, we hadn't realized how important education was until the Taliban tried to stop us.

Fifty seven million children across the world don't want an iPhone, Xbox or chocolates. They want a book and pen.

We liked to be known as the clever girls. When we decorated our hands with henna for holidays and weddings, we drew calculus and chemical formulae instead of flowers and butterflies.

We are starving for education... it's like a precious gift. It's like a diamond.

I said to myself, Malala, you must be brave. You must not be afraid of anyone. You are only trying to get an education. You are not committing a crime.

I want every girl, every child, to be educated.