Nothing, we are all different and unique. The two stories will prove me right.
For ages societies adopted different kinds of imagined hierarchies. Race, caste, social status, economic status, one hierarchy that has withstood against times is gender. Men have got a better deal than women in almost every century and you may ask why? you may also think of an answer and I will let you research you on your own.
Every century has people from both gender achieving human excellence but maybe, maybe only men’s achievements have been recorded. Just look at the following vicious circle, how can one escape from it?
Every moment, every century we have women breaking this vicious circle. Nadia Nadim, an Afghan-Danish football player and Anna Kiesenhofer, a postdoctoral fellow in mathematics from Austria.
Nadia Nadim
Nadia in her own words:
I was born 2nd of January 1988 in Herat Afghanistan where I was raised by my mother and father, together with my four sisters.
When I was young, I got the heartbreaking news that the talibans had executed my father. After that, my family decided to escape Afghanistan, as it was not a safe place for a family of 6 women’s.
We planned to escape to London, where we had a few relatives, and with forged passports we came to Italy thru Pakistan. From there, me and my entire family went on a truck, thinking we where heading towards London. After a few days, we all turfed of the truck, expecting to see Big Ben. We did not. All we saw was trees. We asked a passer-by and found out that the bus had dropped us in Denmark. A small country in the northern parts of Europe, that I these days refer to as home.
I began my professional career playing for B52 in Aalborg, and then came to represent Team Viborg, IK Skovbakken and Fortuna Hjørring. With Fortuna I made my Champions League debut, in September 2012, scoring both goals when we beat Scottish champions Glasgow City 2–1.
I made my debut for the Danish national team in Algarve Cup 2009, and has since then proudly represented my country 73 times, earning 1x UEFA Euro’s bronze medal, and one UEFA Euro’s silver medal, after a though loss against the hosting nation, Holland in 2017.
Except playing football, Im also a medical student at Aarhus University, and quite soon my title will become Dr Nadim. I speak 9 languages fluently, and Im constant in the process of taking on new challenges.
-“I have one goal in life, I want to be the best, in everything I do,”
I got goosebumps reading and imagining her journey.
Let’s go to the other story of Anna Kiesenhofer
Anna Kiesenhofer
A mathematical scholar who took gold at Olympic Games in Tokyo. She has a master’s degree in mathematics from the University of Cambridge, England and a PhD in applied mathematics from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia in Barcelona.
She is currently a postdoctoral researcher at the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL) and is part of a group researching nonlinear partial differential equations which arise in mathematical physics. (tbh I still have no clue about differential equations)
Here’s a Scientist and now an Olympic Gold medalist Anna Kiesenhofer.
We must keep telling these stories to our younger generation and show them that hierarchy doesn’t exist, we are all different and unique.
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See you next time :)
