In the end of April, there were 4 new students from Thailand arrived in Salatiga. They are Miss. Mariam Eadyeesa-I, Miss. Muna Wayeng, Miss. Nurufaraai Sueni, and Miss. Suroya Taleh. They will study at IAIN Salatiga for four years. All of them will be English Education Department (TBI) students of IAIN Salatiga. Thus, they must master Bahasa Indonesia in order to be easier in communication.

On Monday (07/08/18), they started first day to study Bahasa Indonesia in UPTB (Language Service Technical Unit) of IAIN Salatiga. They will be taught by 2 lecturers, Mrs. Marisa Fran Lina, M. Pd. and Mr. Heru Saputra, MA. The course will be held in 8 weeks and every week they will be taught intensively around 20 hours or 4 hours a day. Therefore, it is hoped that they will master Bahasa Indonesia well.

The course activities are varied. At first, we learned from the textbook about how to pronounce alphabet, some words and sentences in Bahasa Indonesia well. They also listened to a dialog in Bahasa Indonesia and answered some questions. It was not too difficult to them since they usually speak Malay language which has some similarities with Bahasa Indonesia. Then, we discussed about students’ life so that they were easier to talk about the topic based on their context. The tutor also inserted some fun games such mind mapping which became an ice-breaker after tiring of doing some tasks. Have a nice learning, Guys. (MFL/IO)