But first, here's living proof that education can change your life and the lives of those around you. Masoud Juya was born in a village near the Afghan city of Herat. From an early age, he worked in the family carpet-weaving business, but he also studied hard. When he was just 14, he opened his own school which teaches hundreds of pupils. Now Masoud is 28 and he's expanding his education business by opening his own private university. On the line from Herat, Masoud told me his story.
I actually started to work in carpet-weaving industry when I was five years old. And after working for three years, I became an expert in carpet weaving. And then I started supervising, you know, our small company, and then I did carpet weaving for a few years, yup.
And your parents didn't have much education. Did they want to get an education for you? Did they send you to school?
Sure. Actually education in my family, for me as the youngest kid, as well as my elder brothers and sisters who are all educated, has been a great value and my parents did want me to go to school.
So what was the school like when you first went there?
Oh well, when I first went to school I was five years old and I remember a teacher saying that I was not able to talk fluently in, you know, in my native language because I was very, you know, young. And so I remember I was not performing very well in the first semester. However, starting from the second semester till the end of the school I was the top student in my class and sometimes the top student in the school or in the whole province.
