Maymunah

“Some of the fighters wear the best uniforms, do the best drills, but hardly anyone has seen them fighting. Some you won't even think that they are fighters, but they are the best knights on the battlefield.”
― Zain Hashmi, A Blessed Olive Tree: A Spiritual Journey in Twenty Short Stories

“Happiness comes from helping others, by being with others, and by sharing, even if it's only a smile.”
― Zain Hashmi, A Blessed Olive Tree: A Spiritual Journey in Twenty Short Stories

“And when your soul, the flame, the spark, meets with the divine fuel that is so pure and so strong, it results in immense enlightenment: the enlightenment of God. Light upon light, Noorun Alaa Noor.”
― Zain Hashmi, A Blessed Olive Tree: A Spiritual Journey in Twenty Short Stories

“You cannot say to the sun, 'More sun,' or to the rain, 'Less rain.' To a man, geisha can only be half a wife. We are the wives of nightfall. And yet, to learn kindness after so much unkindness, to understand that a little girl with more courage than she knew, would find her prayers were answered, can that not be called happiness? After all these are not the memoirs of an empress, nor of a queen. These are memoirs of another kind.”
― Arthur Golden, Memoirs of a Geisha