Herald Tribune
By Vin Mannix
Columnist
When 16-year-old Mikaela Boelkins awakens nowadays, it’s not to the sound of her iPhone at home.
Rather, the Lakewood Ranch teenager is awakened by the undulating Islamic call to prayer emanating loudly from numerous minarets in Rabat, Morocco, where she is staying with a host family this summer.
“It’s very intriguing … different,” she writes in her entertaining blog at mikaelainmorocco.com, adding in a separate email, “But I couldn’t be happier about living in a country as culturally unique — Arab, Berber, French and even a little Spanish influence — for the next four to five weeks.”
A junior in Southeast High’s International Baccalaureate program, Mikaela has been in the North African nation since June 23. She’s one of 660 students from more than 3,300 applicants to earn a place in the National Security Language Initiative for Youth — a U.S. Government initiative to improve Americans’ ability to communicate in select critical languages and engage with people from around the world.
“This program is actually a continuation of my Arabic study I began freshman year,” Mikaela said in her email. “I decided to study Arabic for two reasons: First, I was interested in exploring a language outside of the Romance languages. I take Spanish in school and wanted something different and more intellectually challenging, which Arabic never fails to live up to. And second, I wanted to do my part in attempting to understand what I see as a widely misunderstood culture and I thought the best way to do that would be through learning Arabic.”
