“I always sat in the first row. I always had the highest rank in class. I wanted to be a teacher, just like my teachers. But when it was time to enroll in grade seven, my mother told me we couldn’t afford it. I cried and begged but she just stayed silent. My teachers were so sad that they offered to pay half of the tuition. But it wasn’t enough because we’d still have to pay for the books and exams. So my mother made me understand that school was not in my luck. I’m still seventeen, but now I’m married and I work as a maid for a family. I wash their clothes, wash their dishes, clean their bathroom. Their house is near a school. So every morning I have to watch the children walk by in their uniforms.”

(Dhaka, Bangladesh)

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