Speaking the language of love, Arabic

Dubai - Arabic is more than what it is - it can bond mothers and toddlers better.

Nadia Wehbe, who won $50,000 as the first-prize winner in Ro'Ya 2014 for her business Baby Arabia, is now planning to expand and explore various partnerships by branding it.
Ro'Ya, which means "vision" in Arabic, was launched in 2014 by the Dubai Business Women Council in collaboration with MasterCard to offer coaching to existing and aspiring entrepreneurs as well as the chances to win funding for their companies.
Baby Arabia is a creative language programme offered in Arabic, French and Spanish for parents, children and nurseries.
Wehbe, mother of two sons - seven-year-old Kai and five-year-old Teo - got the inspiration for her business from a class she took with Kai, who was born in Mexico.
"I lived in Mexico for a while where my son Kai was born, and, as a first-time mum, I attended a local mother and toddler group," she recalls. "What surprised me was that simply by joining in with their traditional songs and rhymes, the language difference wasn't really so much of a barrier, and also I learned so much from the local women."
"Culturally, mother-and-toddler groups don't really exist in Arab communities and I saw a chance to help improve cultural integration and understanding by starting one that would bridge the gap between Western and Eastern mums and tots," she said.
Wehbe, the half-British, half-Palestinian/Lebanese entrepreneur, set up her company in 2011 after discovering a lack of mother-and-baby groups in Dubai that encouraged the use of other languages besides English.
"When I looked for similar baby and toddler groups in Dubai, I noticed they were mainly in English. None of them were being offered in Arabic," she said.
As a child of mixed-race parents and being married to a European, Wehbe felt she needed the support of a community to introduce Arabic to her son. She decided to start her own programme, which offers a "Mother and Baby" group but will soon launch other activities such as crafts, sports and music - all in Arabic.
"It's a mother-and-toddler group [six months to three years] that encourages cultural familiarisation and understanding of Arabic through songs and stories," she said. "I used to teach Arabic and realised that children - even native speakers - really struggled with the subject when they had to study it at four years old because they weren't getting enough exposure to it at home and during their early year," Wehbe said.
"We also provide language solutions to nurseries and train Arabic the Baby Arabia way to nursery language teachers."
"Everyone has different reasons for introducing a language to their child. Mine is simple: I believe that offering our sons extra languages can only be a positive step in their intellectual and social development - especially when meeting and understanding people of different cultures."
Having set the business up three years ago, she entered Ro'Ya 2014 to help her focus on further developing the idea from a commercial perspective. "As an entrepreneur, I saw Ro'Ya as a brilliant opportunity to help me learn about how to expand my business, and see what I was and wasn't doing," she said.
"I believed the workshops would help get me there... I never thought I would win."
"In fact, the win has enabled me to look deeper into the needs of my business. I got the help I needed to expand into a licenced/franchise product, which enables any nursery, parent or pre-school to adopt our programme with ease and precision," Wehbe said.
Baby Arabia also offers some innovative products for its programme, like a Baby Arabia music CD, flashcards, alphabet cushion and a flip-chart book, all products are translated and with phonetics to enable all the community to read, learn and have fun with Baby Arabia.
For aspiring entrepreneurs, Wehbe's advice is to "believe in what you want to do, have the energy and stamina to go through to have your own business".
"Think about what it is you truly want to achieve and use Ro'Ya to see how you can make that happen. It's not just about the win."
"Learn as much as you can, see the viability, ask questions and take the help offered, then present a well-thought-out plan that you believe in," Wehbe said.
- riaz@khaleejtimes.com