But not immediately. On Pakistan’s fiftieth anniversary on 14 August 1997 there were parades and commemorations throughout the country. However, my father and his friends said there was nothing to celebrate as Swat had only suffered since it had merged with Pakistan. They wore black armbands to protest, saying the celebrations were for nothing, and were arrested. They had to pay a fine they could not afford.

但好运并没有即刻降临。1997年8月14日，巴基斯坦的第五十个国庆节这天，全国上下都举行了游行和庆祝活动。然而，父亲和他的朋友们却抗议这种庆祝。他们认为，斯瓦特自从并入巴基斯坦后，就一直在过苦日子。他们戴上黑色臂章以示抗议，并说庆祝活动根本没有意义。结果，他们被逮捕，还要付一笔没人付得起的罚金。

A few months after I was born the three rooms above the school became vacant and we all moved in. The walls were concrete and there was running water so it was an improvement on our muddy shack, but we were still very cramped as we were sharing it with Hidayatullah and we almost always had guests. That first school was a mixed primary school and very small. By the time I was born it had five or six teachers and around a hundred pupils paying a hundred rupees a month.

我出生几个月后，学校楼上有了三间空房，于是我们搬了进去。房子是水泥墙，也有了自来水，与之前的棚屋相比，环境算是改善了，但因为我们跟希达亚图拉一起分租，加上几乎天天都有访客，屋里仍旧非常拥挤。一开始，学校规模很小，是所混合式的小学。到我出生的时候，学校里有五六位老师，近百位学生，每人每月付一百卢比的学费。

My father was teacher, accountant and principal. He also swept the floors, whitewashed the walls and cleaned the bathrooms. He used to climb up electricity poles to hang banners advertising the school, even though he was so afraid of heights that when he got to the top of the ladder his feet shook. If the water pump stopped working, he would go down the well to repair it himself. When I saw him disappear down there I would cry, thinking he wouldn’t come back. After paying the rent and salaries, there was little money left for food. We drank green tea as we could not afford milk for regular tea. But after a while the school started to break even and my father began to plan a second school, which he wanted to call the Malala Education Academy.

我父亲是老师、会计，也是校长。他也擦地、粉刷墙壁和洗厕所。他还会爬上电线杆悬挂为学校做招生宣传的布条--虽然他很怕高，每次爬到顶端时总是两腿发抖。如果抽水机坏了，他也要爬进井里修好机器。每次我看到他消失在井里，就会大哭，觉得他不会再回来了。每个月，付了房租、发完薪水，买食物的钱所剩无几。我们喝不起加了牛奶的茶，所以我们都喝绿茶。一段时间之后，学校终于开始收支平衡，父亲开始考虑开办第二所学校，名字他都取好了，就叫“马拉拉教育学院”。