Hatoon Kadi is a Saudi Arabian comedienne, best known for her YouTube show Noon Alniswa, where she has over 355,000 subscribers. Hatoon uses satire to present social phenomena from a woman's perspective, and is one of the funniest people I’ve ever met. Perfectly bilingual in Arabic and English, she also teaches Research Methodology at a private university. Hatoon started her career as IT support – that person you call if you’re computer gives you blue screen of death, or your hard drive self-combusts. Cables and mouses were not her end game and she pursued her PhD in social science & information systems.
Hatoon was inspired to start creating content while she was doing her PhD, when she realized that there were plenty of Saudi Arabian internet comedians, but almost no women at the time. We had a high-energy discussion about her path, going from IT personnel to YouTube comedy. We talked about how Hatoon’s career prior to freelance comedy instilled in her habits that have served her well professionally. We talked about the messages we receive as children and why they should be revisited. We covered cyber-bullying, the imposter syndrome and self-worth. Hatoon also shared practical tips on content creation.
My two favorite quotes of the episode are: “Knowledge is nothing without sharing it”. And “It’s brave to quit if things are not working”.
Hatoon recommended books by two Egyptian authors: Youssef El Sibai and Mustafa Mahmoud - as well as the work of Elizabeth Gilbert.
To see Hatoon in action, head to her YouTube channel Noon Alniswa. If you'd like to get in touch with Hatoon, you can find her @hatoonkadi on Twitter and Instagram.
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