Zaina talks about her motivation for participating in ‘Letters from Palestine’, a joint Encompass and Solutions Not Sides programme which connects high school students in Palestine with students in the UK via a letter exchange, as well as what she learnt during the process:

“My name is Zaina Amoudi, I’m 14 years old from Nablus. I have recently joined the “Letters from Palestine” project for four main reasons; First, In order to improve my written and spoken English (since English is not my native language) through getting involved in various activities and being encouraged to write a letter (to a Pen-pal from the UK), speak out, and talk more about myself and my identity with other participants from Palestine who come from different cities, communities, and with different mindsets.

Second reason, I wanted to get to know to more people and make new friends. Third, I have always wanted to have a friend from the UK and know more about the UK, the culture, and the life there. Therefore, once Mr. Mohammed had told me about Letters from Palestine, I was highly motivated to get enrolled in it. Finally, I decided to challenge myself to join because socializing or speaking in front of a crowd can be a little bit hard for me because I am not used to it and I get really nervous when I speak to others.

In my humble opinion, this project is so interesting and fun to the extent that it has many advantages and many reasons that make me love being a part of it, but I would like to shed the light on one of the significant points that I mentioned above (my social anxiety issue). It is a part of my life and only socializing might help me get over. In addition, this project did really help me with this part even though it was hard for me. I also feel that this project is already helping me a lot with cultivating my personality, improving my writing and my public-speaking skills.

I am so glad I have already made some new nice friends and we have made some memories. One of the funny moments I still remember is when I was going to one of the meeting with my new friends and I accidentally I dropped a full table of socks that was on the sidewalk in Tulkarem city and my friends helped me pick them up and laughed at me lol.

To conclude, this project makes me like learning and studying more because we learn and have fun at the same time, unlike schools. I really appreciate all the work and efforts that have been given and done for us and this is all really important to me ❤.”