This month we had our third Arabic intensive in the beautiful Northern Beaches of NSW. The idea behind these intensives is to get away and immerse ourselves in the language for a few days. There is something special about about spending time with amazing people, eating good food and learning together. This year we had activities like a poetry slam in Arabic with our guest poet Sara Saleh. Hadieh taught us Arabic idioms and each group had to come up with a play in Arabic that explained that idiom. We had last year’s Arabic Masterchef challenge where each team was competing to cook the tastiest dish. Teams were divided into two and one half would have to give the ingredients and instructions all in Arabic. The absolute highlight for me though, was getting all the students to present a five minute presentation of their favourite verse from the Quran, saying of the Prophet Muhammad or prayer, translating it from Arabic and talking about a time in their life where it really helped them or how it inspired them. Hearing these experiences and how the language connects with their lives was truly phenomenal.

Here are some highlights of the intensive. My dream one day is to have these for our students in different cities all over the world. One day inshallah!