This was the second gathering held during the month of Ramadan. This gathering was on Wednesday, April 11, 2023. The gathering was joined by the Head of Language Service of Hasanuddin University (UNHAS), Herawaty Abbas, Ph.D. and her Secretary, Dr. Indriati Lewa, Taskforce of International Office (IO), Jamaluddin Fitrah Alam, Ph.D. and Rafika Nurul Hamdani Ramli, LL.M, IO staff, and their international students.
The gathering aimed to share our international students’ experiences in teaching and learning Indonesian Language, or Bahasa Indonesia untuk Penutur Asing (BIPA)/ Indonesian Language for Non-Indonesia Speakers, which was conducted by UNHAS Language Center (ULC). The gathering began with the welcome remark by Muhammad Ridwan, M.A, on behalf of the IO. In his statement, Ridwan said that all international students were required to be able to speak and practice their Bahasa daily as the language would be used for daily activities, including when dealing with local patients for medical students, for example.
The second remark was from ULC, beginning with Herawaty Abbas, Ph.D., and then continued with Dr. Indriati Lewa. In her statement, she emphasized that international students have had to practice their Bahasa. ULC was widely open for international students wishing to practice their Bahasa with other local students as other students did, like Duua, Mustafa, Louis, and many more.
The main agenda of the gathering was to share the experiences of three different international students. It began with Abdul Azis, an Iraqi student who had been here at UNHAS since 2019. He also encouraged his fellow students to practice their Bahasa more and more. In addition, the second speaker was Mustafa. He also did the same with his fellow students by encouraging them to practice the language. The last speaker was Duua, and she had nothing more to say but to motivate her fellow friends to utilize their Bahasa. Each student was given the same duration of time to share.
