Part of me always wanted to do something useful for the world. It came from my mother. She is a paediatrician and she was active in a small NGO for the child victims of war.

In a way, it has been an advantage for me to be a woman because there is always some academic committee that needs you to fill a quota!

The differences in income between the poor world and the rich world are so great that people have to be interested.

I've never had a TV in my whole life. Television passed by me.

For millions of girls around the world, motherhood comes too early. Those who bear children as adolescents suffer higher maternal mortality and morbidity rates, and their children are more likely to die in infancy.

The logic is that when you provide schools or any social service to people, they have no choice. They have to take what you give them, because they don't have the money to pay for schools themselves; that's why you provide schools in the first place.