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My mother named me after a miracle of nature: Waris means desert flower. The desert flower blooms in a barren environment where few living things can survive.

Waris Dirie

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Waris Dirie
Age: 59
Born: 1965
Born: October 21
Autobiographer
Feminist
Film Actor
Goodwill Ambassador
Model
Novelist
Writer
Galcaio
Galkayo
Living
Blooms
Means
Barren
Mother
Named
Nature
Desert
Mean
Survive
Things
Miracle
Flower
Environment

More quotes by Waris Dirie

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I don't know what a supermodel is. If they call me that, I might have to punch them. It's just so vain and so unreal.
Waris Dirie
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I love the truth. Tell the truth and live the truth, because we've seen enough lies and look what it's doing.
Waris Dirie
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I've never been one to stay still. I was born a nomad, and I still am a nomad and always will be.
Waris Dirie
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Brooklyn's good. Brooklyn's funky. Brooklyn's happening.
Waris Dirie
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If you can survive in the desert, you survive anywhere. I know more than anything life in desert. You can tell by looking at the dirt how long ago it rained, how hard it rained, how much water came through. You can by looking at a plant, a tree, from an animal's look. I can read the desert like I read my hand.
Waris Dirie
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I still do find it very difficult in the West to connect to this politeness of smiling, not saying how you're thinking or not saying how you really feel.
Waris Dirie
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Give love and share happiness with the people around you, and never give up fighting for what you believe in.
Waris Dirie
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Mama tied a blindfold over my eyes. The next thing I felt my flesh was being cut away. I heard the blade sawing back and forth through my skin. The pain between my legs was so intense I wished I would die.
Waris Dirie
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Female genital mutilation targets little girls, baby girls - fragile angels who are helpless, who cannot fight back. It's a crime against a child, a crime against humanity. It's abuse. It's absolutely criminal and we have to stop it.
Waris Dirie
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Less hatred, more love, less war, more peace, more respect for the Mother Nature and for other people.
Waris Dirie
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I know what I am fighting for. I am fighting for the most basic rights of innocent children. And that is why I never take the criticism too deep under my skin.
Waris Dirie
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Fashion is fun, ridiculously fun. But it's base and it's wrong. You're not doing anything good for the world. You're just saying, 'Buy it, buy it, buy it.
Waris Dirie
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We need to empower women: provide them with work for their own income, and teach them to become independent of men so they will never have to have their children suffering the same torture.
Waris Dirie
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Don’t do to your daughters what has been done to you! They are perfect and beautiful.
Waris Dirie
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Somalia is facing many problems, I don't even know where to start.
Waris Dirie
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I always knew, from the very day of my own mutilation, that I would one day fight against this practice. I did not know how and when, but I knew that I would fight it.
Waris Dirie
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In the current situation, it is very difficult for foreign NGOs to work in Somalia because it is so unstable and dangerous. I really hope that my country will one day rise out of this mess and reach the potential it has.
Waris Dirie
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Laws are important. But they can only be effective if the people know about the particular laws.
Waris Dirie
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Sometimes I wonder where I am from. I am either way ahead or I come from another world. I don't recognise this world.
Waris Dirie
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FGM breaches all human rights and has no place in any 21st century society.
Waris Dirie