Spring in the Hindu Kush Mountains

My Scholarship Entry - The Secret Tribe of Kalash

Pakistan | Monday, November 24, 2014 | 5 photos

I realize you've received hundreds of applications for this scholarship. You've seen thousands of stunning photos, read thousands of moving words about the applicants' aspirations, struggles, their life-changing travel experiences.

I could do the same. I could describe my particular struggles as a Pakistani-Muslim woman, using the 'disadvantages' of my nationality, my gender, the society I was born in, to my advantage. I could enthuse about my own peripatetic lifestyle, mooring in 5 cities across 3 continents over the past 7 years, my ability to speak Spanish as a third language. About that time I jumped off a 40-ft high cliff into a moonlit lake, or gazed into the haunting eyes of a snow leopard.

I could tell you that working for the National Geographic Magazine is something I've dreamed of since I was 7 years old, when we received our first copy in the mail at home in Lahore. That photography is something I love to do so much that I have yet not been able to forge a career out of it.

But you've read it all before. So, let me say just one thing: I believe in myself. I believe in my eye, my hand, my heart, in my own curiosity and limitless capacity to learn.

I hope you will too.