Salam alaikum wa rahmatullah wa barakato from here I'm going to try and speak in English so I do apologize to those who may have difficulty in understanding English but I think the message that I wish to share with you today is one that you will understand from my heart I'm going to speak about education because education brings to me the most important gift that I have ever had 77 years ago a little girl was being born in her gaze a group Hospital the mother who was delivering that baby have difficulty bringing this child out to
the world luckily there were doctors who have the skills and the knowledge the pole that little girl out with forceps forceps says at that time were very dangerous because they were rough because they were so hard on the skull of a little newborn baby that very few children survived the birth through a forceps delivery that little girl lived to become this old woman today we're going to talk to you about education I'm proud to be talking to you about education because seventy years ago when I was old enough to go to school there were no
schools for girls it was considered unwise undesirable unnecessary to teach a girl to read and write but thankfully I had that opportunity not in Somaliland because there were no schools for girls at that time but in neighboring Djibouti in neighboring French Somaliland and my first language became French it opened the door to me that taught me skills to write to calculate to think and also to achieve certain standards that allowed me to reach a level where I would get a certificate or a diploma that opportunity also gave me the opportunity to see and understand how
far one could go and reach through education because I was surrounded by people who had a great knowledge people who have achieved excellence in the different fields and people who also provided to me literature and books and magazines an opportunity to learn from what was happening beyond the borders of the country that I was born in and the one in which I was being educated there was a big world out there there was a world that was filled with scientists there was a world that was filled with filled with experts in different field in science
in arts in literature in medicine in every field in this world and then in 1954 I competed for an examination and passed and won a scholarship to go to England and I flew from the airport but is just less than a kilometer away from here on a plane that was a dc-10 you would know what the dc-10 is it was a little plane with propellers that made a lot of noise and that took two days to fly from here to London and made frequent stops in fact it was nicknamed grasshopper flights because he could take
off from here and land in Aden and then in half - and then in Cairo and then in Greece I think and I think in Paris and then London so it was a grasshopper flights that opportunity took me to London where I did further studies and studied that's profession for which I have that great passion that I have for treating sick people they taught me nursing and then it taught me and even better skills it taught me to become a midwife and it taught me the skills that would help me to try and deliver little
babies who had difficulties coming out the way I had difficulties coming out education is what enabled me to learn that continued came back here and shared my skills with my people started training others started teaching showing become an example becoming a role model for others and today I am so proud to be speaking to you on my second TEDx speech not in Switzerland or another country but in my hometown her geisha in Somaliland and on top of a hill that at one time has anti-aircraft guns mounted upon its that were mounted not to pull to
shoot at airplanes bring down airplanes but to shoot at the community to shoot at the city of her geisha and destroy schools and destroy hospitals and destroy homes today that Hill is where we are on this beautiful hotel from where we are making aesthetics and an even greater pleasure and a greater honor to me is that a good number of the people who have organized this TEDx are females those who have an education girls who have skills to organize and to manage and put a put up a facility like this and a program like this
now education is something that was not born yesterday an education is not something that only comes with writing or reading we are all here today because we come from that great people who lived in the Horn of Africa that great nomadic people who were experts in herding their livestock who were experts in herding their camels experts in poetry experts in mediation experts in dialogue and discussions experts in communication and I know most of you have heard or listened to some Adelaide poetry that dates back to several hundred hundreds of years and that were conceived and
composed by people who may or may not have learned how to read and write but that was something that they did because they were educated in that skill of composing of rhythm and rhyme education comes to you from your heart education is something that you should seek and that you should enjoy and that you should always replenish education is something that never ends I'm still learning at 77 I'm still teaching but most of all I am learning I'm learning from you I'm excited by what you can do and the things that's really excite me the
most and give me so much pleasure is when I travel and I come across people like you some of you were born at times when my country was at war some of you were just maybe little toddlers who today are scientists both here and elsewhere in the world a few days ago I came across a young Somali scientist who is doing another PhD on research and the research that as young that young man was doing was among the latest the sensitive of the art science of today stem cell research on cartilage now how specific a
more specific could that become because we know that when a cartilage is cut a cartilage is cut and remains does not regenerate like muscle does and to do research on say um stem cells to see and learn how cartilage can be brought to regenerate itself to the to me was a great gift to learn about and the vet and to know that that young scientist was someone who is from her basin some 14 years ago I was invited to attend the Millennium celebrations in Chicago and that's when 1999 was moving out to become 2000 and
there was a great anxiety in the world nobody knew what computers were gonna do nobody knew what information was going to be lost and among the 15 people who were on duty in Chicago City that night to make sure that there were no glitches in the computers and there would be no information or data lost was a young man a telecommunications engineer and the next verse from Braille now what is that's who I want you to reach for these are the people I would like you to use as an example and role models I want
you to be to develop that hunger for knowledge that these young people had to get them to where they are today I want you to seek excellence I would like you to go for it because you can because it is there for you to reach it is there in the world for you to grab and get and improve and contribute to and become that example and that unit that contributes to the global development of nations and particularly to development of our country Somaliland now I would like to share with you a very quick information that
I think you will all be proud of in Summerland or anywhere in the world we have babies who are born with congenital malformations and some of them are born with malformations that we can correct and some we cannot correct and those we can correct are the ones that are born with a lot of water in the brain it's called hydrocephalus or hydrocephaly and that water suffocates the brain that water the pressure of that water damages the brain and until a couple of years ago there was nothing we could do for those children but I'm so
happy and so proud to share with you the information that today we can do this operation here in Somaliland and that we can do it free of charge and that we can do it at a state of perfection that today we have not lost I think more than two children and the number of children we have and that we follow up for two years an 83 children not fat that comes with knowledge that comes with training that comes with perseverance that comes with ambition that comes with dedication that comes with all the qualities that I
want you to develop that comes with all the qualities that are in you and that you've got to find inside you and failure is not an option giving up is never an option perseverance is what I want to the last day in your life you do it you go after it and you get it on this hill that was once a site from where people were killed I want you to take back this knowledge this message that you will take knowledge and message that will give life to our country that will give life to our
people that would give hope to our people and that will increase the pluses that I have been talking about the achievements that I have been talking about you can do it you must do it you over to us you over to yourselves you over to your families you owe it to Somaliland thank you very much thank you
