Hi! My name is Shatoo Mohamad. I’m 18 years old and I am a professional tennis player. My mother is from Duhok and my father is from Slemani but I was born and raised here in San Diego, California. I started playing tennis at the age of seven. Fast forward to November of 2018, I began playing professional tournaments. I train anywhere from 4-6 hours every day, and I am constantly traveling due to the fact that many of the professional tournaments are national and international. It hasn’t been a full year of playing professional tennis, but I’ve made a lot of progress. Due to match wins I’ve had, I’ve been able to obtain a WTA ranking which is the official professional ranking system. As far as I know, I am the only Kurdish player with a WTA ranking. To top it all of, last week I had my biggest win so far, beating a player who was 28 years old and had a career-high ranking of 170 in the world. Right now my biggest problem is finding a sponsor(s). I’ve tried reaching out to some people in the Kurdish community, but they don’t take me seriously, and I think it’s largely because a girl playing a professional sport instead of going to college is just something they’ve never heard or seen of. When I tell people in our community that I play professionally, they either congratulate me, judge me or don’t take me seriously. I have a unique platform that will only grow as I become more successful, and I really do believe I can empower so many girls and women to get involved in a sport or to just stay active. I personally have not seen many girls in our community getting involved athletically and I want to change that. I would love to see Kurds more open and understanding that playing a professional sport is also a great career. Currently, my team and I are working on becoming number 1 in the world. I want to prove to everyone that anyone, especially a Kurdish girl can become a professional athlete and be the best at it. It’s definitely not easy, I’ve been my biggest supporter throughout this entire journey, but the most important thing is, I know I can make it. My parents have sacrificed a lot for me to be in the position I am in now. Every single day, our focus is on tennis and how to improve. My goal in the upcoming months is to win a professional tournament and ultimately, for now, I’m working hard to build my ranking up so I can qualify to play in the Grand-slams such as the US Open