Welcome to Learning English, a daily 30-minute program from the Voice of America.

I'm Katie Weaver.

And I'm Mario Ritter, Jr.

This program is designed for English learners, so we speak a little slower and we

use words and phrases especially written for people learning English.

Coming up on the show, Anna Mateo presents the Health and Lifestyle Report.

Do you have some New Year's resolutions?

Anna tells about some tricks to help you stick to those goals.

We also have a report from John Russell, and we close the show with The Lesson of the Day.

But first, this story from Jill Robbins.

Leibaba Rashid is a 22-year-old Pakistani student in a special training program in the city of Lahore.

The program, called Women on Wheels, or Wow, teaches women how to operate two-wheelers or motorcycles.

Rashid hopes her life will change after she learns how to ride a motorcycle.

Although the program is seven years old, it is still rare to see women ride motorcycles.

In the Islamic Nation, it is more common to see women driving cars or riding in the back of two-wheelers

operated by a male relative. The WOW program is offered free by the Lahore Traffic Police.

I hope this will change my life because I am dependent on my brother to pick me up and drop me to college,"

Rashid said on her first day at Wow.

She said she wants to buy a motorcycle to go to college, adding that before there were no

women drivers in her family.

Now everybody is convinced that women should be independent in their movement to schools, jobs, and markets, she said.

Bushra Iqbal Hussein is a social activist and director of safe childhood.

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