About Me

Personal:

My name is Sumaira. I was born in a small village in Punjab, Pakistan, and grew up in Lahore, a city that runs on poetry, storytelling and the sheer pleasure of a well-turned phrase. That love of language was not something I chose. It chose me.
I came to the UAE as a teenager, when my father took up a post at Fujairah Aviation Centre. What felt like uprooting turned out to be the beginning of a life I now consider entirely my own. I have lived here for nearly three decades, and I mean it when I say the UAE feels like home.

Academic:

I graduated from the University of the Punjab with a Master’s degree in English Language and Literature, where I was awarded a gold medal for first position in my cohort and inducted into the Roll of Honour. That degree gave me more than a certificate to frame. It gave me a rigorous, almost instinctive understanding of how language works, how much it carries beneath the surface, and how much can be lost when translation is done without care.
I also hold a CELTA qualification from Cambridge Assessment English. I design my own course materials and assessments for teaching English, Urdu and Punjabi, because I have never found an off-the-shelf course that does quite what I need it to do.

Interests:

I write poetry and prose in Urdu and English, about villages and cities and the people in between. Some of my poetry has been published on Rekhta and Sufinama. A collection of essays about my home village appeared in the genesis issue of Akewi Magazine, and several of my humorous essays and stories have found a home at the Hooghly Review. Writing keeps me honest about language in a way that professional work alone cannot. I think it makes me a sharper translator and a better teacher. My students might agree. Or they might be too polite to say otherwise.