When words take flight

Through her debut novel Turbulence, Hafsa Lodi, who will be at the Emirates Airline Festival of Literature, uses her cross-cultural experiences to reflect on the questions many women carry

- Zenifer Khaleel

At 34, Dubai expat Hafsa Lodi's life story is defined by geography, curiosity and quiet transformation. Raised in the US, she moved to Dubai at the age of 14. This shift deeply influenced her worldview and writing. Dubai has remained her home for nearly two decades, with formative interludes abroad: three years in Toronto completing a BA in journalism at Ryerson University, followed by a year in London pursuing a master's degree in Islamic Law. These cross-cultural experiences continue to inform the layered perspectives in her work.

The first spark

Lodi’s earliest memory of writing is delightfully telling. At 12, while living in California, she wrote an essay to convince her parents she was responsible enough to own a pet cat, and it worked. That small victory planted a seed of creativity. Years later, IB English in high school sharpened her love for analysing literature, themes and poetry. But it was her first magazine internship, writing trend reports, that sealed her path. Journalism, she realised, was not just something she enjoyed, it was what she was meant to do.