Malala Yousafzai has a message for Canadian kids: Don’t wait, to make a difference. Just because you’re young doesn’t mean you can’t be a leader. 

   Yousafzai is an activist for children’s rights, and particularly the right for girls to get an education. In this case, “activist” means that she tries to get that message out, no matter how difficult that may be for her. 

   For Yousafzai, it has been very difficult, indeed. When she was 15 years old, she was attacked on her way to school. Some people in the village where she lived in Pakistan didn’t think girls should be allowed to get an education. They didn’t like Yousafzai going to school, and they wanted her to stop telling people that girls should be allowed to go to school. 

   Yousafzai, who is now 19 years old, was very badly hurt. It took her a long time to recover. But she never stopped telling people about how important it is for girls to get an education. 

   For her courage and thoughtfulness, and her efforts to help girls around the world get an education, Canada has made her an “honorary citizen.” That means, Yousafzai is now Pakistani, but also Canadian. She is just the sixth person in Canada’s history to be awarded that honor.

    In her thank-you speech in Canada’s House of Commons, she had a message for Canadian children. “You don’t have to be as old as the very young Prime Minister Trudeau to be a leader,” she said. She said that when she was very young, she used to think she had to get older before she could make a difference. But she said she knows now that anyone, of any age, can stand up for what they believe is right and make a difference. 

   She also asked Canada’s leaders to take a lead role in raising more money for the education of girls, especially in refugee camps. 

   After her speech, the packed crowd of Canadian politicians gave her a standing ovation and then spontaneously began singing the national anthem, O Canada.

    The Slow Food movement was initiated when a European journalist, Carlo Petrini, saw that a fast-food restaurant had opened in a beautiful square in Rome. He thought it was tragic that many people today live too 11 to sit down for a proper meal and only eat 12 fast food. He decided that he has to try to do something about it, 13 he started the Slow Food movement. 14 he didn't succeed in banning that fast-food restaurant, Slow Food has become a global organization and now has more than 80,000 members in 100 countries.

    Slow Food also encourages people to eat local and regional food, to use local shops and markets, to eat out in small family restaurants, and to cook 15 traditional recipes. As member Jon Winge says, "I think it's such a cool idea. You support the people who produce beautiful products for you.”