WORLD BOOK DAY!

WORLD BOOK DAY!

Finally the day has arrived 6th of March, on which I will be launching my book "Time for Bed Zayd" at my old primary school where my journey to develop my writing began.

Mr Smith was his name; a man of old principles and discipline who taught me to play chess and write in a script that resembled the scribbling of a child from the Victorian era. Most of all he helped me to think, to feel, to touch and to taste the words that I wrote transforming my monotone, colourless story, into 4D epic adventures.

I have two schools to visits tomorrow, at three different sites, in two different cities where I will share my book with hundreds of children. The best part in reading to the children is witnessing the light in their eyes, which for me is the greatest gift of all.

My earliest memories as a child are of me and my brother crawling into my fathers bed to listen to his stories of far distant lands... in Urdu he would take us on adventures across land and sea. Feeding my imagination and me hanging onto every word, that when the story would end I always begged "just one more..." wide eyes pleading that today before mother became fed up he would read us another.

Today I feel a sense of nervous excitement about my World Book Day readings but somewhere inside of me I cannot help but wonder about all those children that do not have someone to read to them... all those children who have been displaced, become orphans or are sick or those who due to poverty, conflict or war do not have access to books, or time to settle to listen to a story...

My heart hopes and prays that each child has an opportunity to hear and read stories that bring them happiness and I've learned that reading and telling stories is a real privilege.

I ask the Almighty that I have the opportunity to read and share with those less fortunate. Real riches I feel are in that.