Aysha Taryam

“Just as one goes on a fast or a body cleanse you owe it to yourselves to detox your mind, it will not be easy but easy never yielded lasting results.”

“The world believes it was built by love but reading Shah Jahan’s own words on the Taj, one could say it was grief that built the Taj Mahal and it was sorrow that saw it through sixteen years till completion.”

“One’s love for his country is a very sacred emotion that is intertwined with their sense of moral obligation and is an essential part of one’s identity.”

“I have come to realise that the most critical of the social media accounts are the least verbal in real life and I can assure you that most social media trolls have no physical troll land to dwell.”

“Societies have a peculiar way of relating, or more accurately non-relating, to rape maybe because it is so vicious, they choose to live in denial about it.”

“Viciousness is part of the world we live in, some of us choose to ignore it with the rationalisation of wanting only positivity to flow our way. How selfish we have become! That the pain of others has become a hindrance to the fulfilment of our positive selves.”

“In politics, the pen is at its heaviest because it is weighed down by the collective responsibility it holds towards its people and their future in the eyes of the world.”

“In a sea of human beings, it is difficult, at times even impossible, to see the human as being.”

“The cost of war is like an immeasurable tremor that knows no borders, its shockwaves reverberating across the world resulting in universal suffering.”

“The lesson we are indebted to Egypt for, our future generations learned that in the face of oppression silence is never golden.”

“We have reached the age of denial, we have become happiness seekers, afraid to feel. We are told to think positive, to seek only joy. Stores overflow with books selling you ways to rid yourself of ‘negative’ feelings.”

“Violence is violence and can in no way be misconstrued as discipline under any circumstance cultural or otherwise.”

“In this world where I sit at my desk writing these words, people die, they pass on, people are mortal. In the cyber world we inhabit they do not.”

“The Women’s March had restored my faith as I am sure it has introduced the young generation to the new wave of feminism. A feminist movement that was made up of both sexes and all ages and creeds, one that did away with the arguments and stood arm in arm for a greater cause, a cause which the Arab media did not wish to project.”

“Faith is intrinsic to humanity and the freedom to practice one's religion is a right no power can deny”

“We all think we understand love yet we fail to see that no two loves are the same”

“For every Aruna story we hear there are hundreds of thousands that will never be heard, swept under the great rug of shame societies have so eloquently woven. It is up to us to speak up, to lift this heavy rug and reveal the ugliness it conceals.”

“Having to explain to a child of today, who has learned to swipe before they can speak, that certain aspects of a person’s life must remain private for the preservation of one’s sanity is almost frivolous.”

“Democracy should always be viewed with a philosophical perspective rather than a political one, because after all democracy was born to a philosopher and murdered by a politician.”

“Why does it seem easier for us to accept reality when it is within the confinement of the animal kingdom yet so hard for us to face it in our?”