Nobel winner Malala visits hometown in Pakistan for first time since shooting

[WhiteTara]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/nobel-winner-malala-visits-hometown-pakistans-swat-valley-051126085.html

y Asif Shahzad and Jibran Ahmad

MINGORA, Pakistan (Reuters) - Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai visited her birthplace in Pakistan's Swat Valley on Saturday, bursting into tears as she entered her childhood home for the first time since a Taliban gunman shot her in 2012.

The 20-year-old told a family friend she planned to return home after completing her education at Oxford, where she is reading for a degree in politics, philosophy and economics.

Roads were blocked off in the town of Mingora as Yousafzai, known universally by her first name, flew in by military helicopter with her parents and brother.

Security was tight around her former home, now rented by a family friend, Farid-ul-Haq Haqqani, who has kept the young woman's room intact with her books, school trophies and luggage.

"They were weeping. They were kneeling on the ground. They were touching the mud with their eyes,” Haqqani said of Malala and her family. He agreed to be interviewed inside the family home and pointed out a shelf in her room with books including Shakespeare's "Comedy of Errors" and "Romeo and Juliet" as well as a copy of the television series "Ugly Betty".