By Silma Suba
Nayab Malik has lived her whole life in Lahore, Pakistan. She was born there, grew up with her family and friends and graduated earlier this year from Lahore Grammar High School.
She felt safe, happy and comfortable in her hometown.
However, this comfort turned to outrage when one day she picked up a local newspaper and read an article that said people in Lahore were at the highest risk of getting mugged or sexually assaulted.
She did not agree with the article and felt it shed a negative light on the reality of life in Pakistan. It was then that she wanted to change the way the world looks at her country by studying journalism.
“I feel there’s a lot of negativity in the media about my country, which is horrible.” said Malik, “I’m interested in broadcast journalism, mainly because I want to show people real stories from all over the world, stories that speak truly about the people.”
Nayab, who is 19-years-old, is now a freshman at Northwestern University in Qatar (NU-Q) where she is pursuing a degree in journalism.
At Northwestern, she finds herself fascinated by the amount of enthusiasm that the faculty, staff and students have. Since she has travelled to many places around the world, she didn’t find a problem fitting in with the diverse culture found in Doha.
“It’s so refreshing to see people of diverse cultures interacting,” said Malik, “It’s been like about a week and I’ve already made so many friends!”
Apart from journalism, Malik is also interested in blogging, reading books, and considers herself a tech-geek. At NU-Q, she wishes to start a book club to promote a reading culture among students. She runs her own blog called “All Those Small Things” and has around 500 people following her.
“I want to be an all-rounder. I’m not satisfied with meeting a few people, going few places and doing few things,” said Malik. “I run a blog, I want to be a published writer, learn new languages, and I want to travel to as many places as I can. I want to make the most out of everything!”