Hamza Padilla
| 1. Please state your full name, your home university and area of study? |
Hamza Hamdoun Padilla, University of Arizona, Middle Eastern & North African Studies/Arabic
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| 2. Why study Arabic? |
| I chose to study the Arabic language because it is the language of my people, my mother tongue, and a connection to both my mother land of Syria and my family. Not only will studying Arabic in a proper manner enrich the Arabic that I grew up speaking, but it will also connect me to the culture more deeply. |
| 3. Why participate in the Flagship program? |
| Flagship for me gives me the opportunity to learn Arabic in a faster and more advanced pace which allows me to achieve the levels of fluency that I’m striving for at a quicker rate. Furthermore, through flagship I can gain an insight on Arab culture outside the Levant that at times can be so different from what I’m used to |
| 4. What are you looking forward to the most during your Capstone year in Meknes? |
| I am most excited for the opportunity to engage with the community again and show off the Darija I learned from the previous year. It will also be extremely exciting to see familiar faces again both from the previous summer program and from AALIM itself. Also just as important is the food! I can’t wait to eat mashawi! |
| 5. What are your future goals and how does this experience fit in to them? |
| My major goal for the future is to become a Public Diplomacy Officer for the DoD and hopefully one day a diplomat/ambassador in the Middle East. This experience will allow me the chance to experience North African culture and dialect firsthand and equip me with the necessary cultural knowledge to carry out my duties with respect and tact. |
| 6. What advice would you give to future Flagship students? |
| Don’t ever doubt yourself or your abilities coming into this program. When I joined this program last year, I could barely speak a lick of MSA and could barely write. Now, as I embark on my trip to Morocco, I can hold in depth conversations in MSA and write detailed paragraphs about a range of topics. This program and the people running it are here to nurture and advance your language. As long as you put in the effort, you will flourish in this program. |
| 7. Share something fun and interesting about yourself. |
| I’m a pretty good cook/baker especially with Syrian cuisine like basbousa and waraq a’nib. I also practice Arabic calligraphy a lot and come from a long line of calligraphers |