Justin Beiber, Shrek and more: Five things Malala's memoirs reveal about her

I Am Malala, the memoirs of Malala Yousafzai, reveal that the 16-year-old girl who was shot by the Taliban in Pakistan a year ago and who is in the running for the Nobel Peace Prize (to be announced on Friday), is still a teenager at heart. Here are five things you didn’t know about Malala that her memoirs reveal. [caption id=“attachment_1162353” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Malala Yousafzai. Reuters image[/caption] 1. Malala identifies with both Ugly Betty and Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz Malala is a fan of television show Masterchef Australia. She loves the TV show Ugly Betty, whose central character works at a fashion magazine. Malala dreams “of one day going to New York and working on a magazine like her [Betty].” While recuperating from her injuries in hospital, she enjoyed the Shrek movies, but was shocked by the scene in Bend it Like Beckham when the female soccer players take off their jerseys to reveal sports bras. She is also a fan of Justin Bieber. She’s read The Wonderful Wizard of Oz - sent to her by former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown - and identifies with Dorothy who is trying to get home in the novel.  2. Her memories of the shooting a year ago are vivid The shooting is described briefly, but vividly in the book, which is briskly written but full of arresting detail. “The air smelt of diesel, bread and kebab mixed with the stink from the stream where people still dumped their rubbish,” Malala writes. One of her friends told her later that the gunman’s hand had been shaking as he had fired at her. She also remembers that the shooter was a young man, possibly in his twenties. 3. She is very, very homesick, and feels like she’s under house arrest in Britain Malala fondly remembers her home in Swat, a remote, mountainous region of Pakistan, near the Afghan border. She describes it as “the most beautiful place in the world.” She remains determined to return to Pakistan one day. Malala goes to school in England now, and lives with her family in a house behind a big gate in the city of Birmingham. It reminds her a bit of being under house arrest. 4. Malala daydreams about getting her own back against the Taliban Her angst against the terrorist group is clearly reflected when she says, “Sometimes I imagine I’m going along and the Taliban stop me. I take my sandal and hit them on the face and say what you’re doing is wrong. Education is our right, don’t take it from us. There is this quality in me – I’m ready for all situations. So even if (God let this not happen) they kill me, I’ll first say to them, what you’re doing is wrong." At other point, she writes: “How dare the Taliban take away my basic right to education?” 5. She wants to become a politician in Pakistan Malala wants to return home and become a politician, and affect educational and social reforms. She says that she wants to change the future of Pakistan by making education compulsory.“I will be a politician in my future. I want to change the future of my country and I want to make education compulsory,” she said. “I hope that a day will come (when) the people of Pakistan will be free, they will have their rights, there will be peace and every girl and every boy will be going to school,” she told the BBC in an interview. “The bad thing in our society and in our country is that you always wait for someone else to come,” Malala said. With inputs from AP