WARIS DIRIE

I love life. I wish I could live another 500 years, truly. There is so much to do. I don't feel bitter or angry or disappointed. If anything, I am very grateful for where I come from. I have absolutely no regrets.

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.

I can enjoy anywhere, and I can leave it. Life is about moving on.

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.

Brooklyn's good. Brooklyn's funky. Brooklyn's happening.

I've never been one to stay still. I was born a nomad, and I still am a nomad and always will be.

Personal style? I don't really believe in that. Whatever is comfortable.

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.

I love the truth. Tell the truth and live the truth, because we've seen enough lies and look what it's doing.

Because women and girls are not valued equally as human beings, they are treated as less than such. Female genital mutilation is one example of this that has to be stopped.

I belong nowhere and to no one.

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.'

Sometimes I wonder where I am from. I am either way ahead or I come from another world. I don't recognise this world.

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.

Every day, women move mountains. It is an insult to have an international women's day.

Many friends have expressed concern that a religious fanatic will try to kill me when I go to Africa. After all, I’ll be speaking out against a crime many fundamentalists consider a holy practice. I’m sure my work will be dangerous, and I admit to being scared…. But my faith tells me to be strong, that God led me down this path for a reason. He has work for me to do. This is my mission. And I believe that long before the day I was born, God chose the day I will die, so I can’t change that. In the meantime, I might as well take a chance, because that’s what I’ve done all my life.

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.

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.

Women’s loyalty has to be earned with trust and affection, rather than barbaric rituals. The time has come to leave the old ways of suffering behind

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.

Well, of course there’s my own experience of being mutilated as a little child. Having gone through this cruel practice and all the long-term consequences that come with it, I just cannot sit back and watch it being done to thousands of little girls every year. I believe that it is my responsibility to use the attention I get to fight against the continuing practice of FGM.