hello! i’m hawa here you can explore my chaotic , but fun life, mind, & interests
Engineer. Creative. Builder. Optimist.
Lifelong learner.
بِسْمِ ٱللَّٰهِ ٱلرَّحْمَٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ
hi, i'm hawa 🧚🏽♀️ i'm an undergraduate senior @ the university of washington studying computer science. i'm deeply curious about early-stage startups, AI, and the ways we can build tools that enhance creativity and independent thinking.
i love building communities and technology that spark creativity, encourage exploration, and inspire others to push the boundaries of what’s possible. during my time @UW, i've helped build tutors of the smiling coast, cseed, swecc, the animation fund, & the undergrad research community. I am also a host at saturdays!
my latest project i'm working on is thx, a social gratitude board that fosters appreciation and connection, and sura, an early-stage hardware x AI project designed to help kids explore the world in new ways.✨
i'm very serious about surrounding myself with curious, kind, ambitious, and high-integrity people who are always learning and pushing themselves. if that sounds like you, pls reach out :)
i also love mentoring people so you can always feel free to reach out to me if you have questions. i'm very chill so don't be scared !!!
disclaimer: i suck at texting so just be prepared that it takes me a while to reply (working on it!)
i feel like i’ve lived many many many lives.
in my past, i was one of the top 11 soccer players in washington, projected to go D1 & play on the U.S. National Team. alongside middle & high school, i completed a 5-year islamic law degree while mastering arabic and studying 150+ religions. i learned hebrew, classical chinese, and sanskrit to read sacred texts like the talmud, vedas, and i-ching in their original form.
some of my (less serious) past ventures:
🍿 i sometimes post coding vids just for fun on my youtube channel
🖼️ sold hand-drawn art & portraits at 7
📱 jailbroke iPhones at 8
💿 burned & sold disks at 9
🎨 designed & sold nike shoes online at 11
🌈 built a 100K-follower meme page
🥪 ran a thriving snack business in elementary school (until the principal shut me down RIPPP)
🕵🏾♀️ ask me about….. intuition, risk, bad choices, intention, purpose, taste, religion, memory, conspiracy theories, my thoughts on marijuana (tldr: i think the ancient greeks & egyptians used some form of weed), charisma, ego, & community building
fun facts: i speak 5 languages, once listened to the song judas by lady gaga on repeat for 32 hours straight, & i have a twin brother (who happens to be in the desert right now)
recent experiences ✰
AWS Elasticache
Software Engineer (Full Time)
2024-PRESENT
cseed
Founder, Co-President
2023-PRESENT
some fun things i've built 🍬
✰ thx: a gratitude engine for friends to leave kind notes on each others boards.
✰ monti: we replace traditional homework assignments for kids with more meaningful assignments inspired by montessori principles to create the next generation of thinkers and leaders
✰ pods: enables writers and creators to transform their unrefined thoughts and writings into engaging podcasts
✰ liminary.io: early stage engineering & product experimentation via my internship at madrona venture labs
✰ ottotheagent: early stage engineering & product experimentation via my internship at madrona venture labs
✰ reality ai : reimagining parental control. more comprehensive and more thorough (1st Place at Scale AI Generative AI Hackathon)
internships 🦄
Microsoft
Software Engineer
2023
Madrona Venture Labs
Software + Product
2024
Blue Origin
Software Engineer
2023
Software Engineer
2022
Amazon
Software Engineer
2022
Symetra
Software Engineer
2021
people who inspire me 💌
thank you to everyone who continues to inspire me everyday! be it past students, TAs, peers at school, professors, friends, uber drivers, strangers, baristas and more :)
My parents, Siblings, Yuquan Deng, Manasa Lingireddy, Andrey Risukhin, Judy Kang, Grace Jun, Adam Towers, Avni Rao, Raghav Narula, Ellie Marsh, Meera Patel, Sashiv Bhatina, Parsa Khazaeepoul, Kianna Bolante, Anissa Abu-Hadba, Jason Guo, Angela Wu, Sam Dore, Isabelle Reksopuro, Aiden Bai, Japeheth Seifu, Francisco Neto (my Uber driver from Brazil!), Aisha Cora, Kyle Johnson, Clare Edmonds, Molly Cantillon, Aruna Srivastava, Tiffany Horter, Layla Airola, Kai Daniels, Eyad Alsilimy, Ian Cooper, Andre Ye, Iris Zhou, Eric Yeh, Sonia Fereidooni, Aryan Mahindra, Sofia Barry, Vi Le, Jennifer Duong, Tiffany Wong, Kevin Farhat, Tiffany Yan, Huayue (Lucia) Zou, Jaela Field, Arman Mohammed, Gagan Singh, Elisha Jeon, Aditi Jain, Dasha Orlov, Niyati Trivedi, Marco Gardida Cortes, Yasmine Shubber, Shiina Sugioka, Martin Johnson, Vani Agarwal, Ahmed Ghaddah, Fardeem Munir, Eyoel Gebri, Hana Smahi, Joey Krueger, Ankith Tunuguntla, Yerim Heo, Cristian Garay, Hannah Jiang, Romero Hutapea, Ruhee Rajwani, Mekedes Dejenie, Varun Agrawal, Chaytan Inman, Sorrel Alvason, Jake Harper, Farah Ali, Kurtis Heimerl, Youssef Ben Taleb, Elias Belzberg, Tia Bjornson, Sydney Lai, Gurucharan Lingamallu, Alan Leong, Gen Sakura, Mya Baker, Jana Radwan, Nithi Byreddy, Caleb John, Farhan Khan, Jamarri Morrison, Luna Chen, Jenny Peng, Paulo Nascimento, Chloe Dolese Mandeville, Lee Janzen Moral, Ariel Fu, Sreshth Kharbanda, Samudra Mowar, Tamara Enriquez, Arya Sanjay, Kevin Zatloukal, Heer Patel, Amy Zhang, Carter Swartout, Farrel Sudrajat, Amy Lu, Daniel Sunn Kim, James Livingston, Eric Xiao, Connor Maginnis, Yali Mu, Sukhmanreet Kaur, Ivan Artyukhov, Deeksha Vatwani, Abby Tran, Jessica Wang, Nila Keri, Harshitha Rebala, Ashrith Bandla, Zeynep Toprakbasti, Jonus Li, Sara Wu, Maria Protogeru, Brett Wortzman, Isabel Froelich, James Froelich, Aya Griswold, Benjamin Zhang, Camila Morales, Shawn Collinge, Elijah Melton, Aditya Khowal, Sophia Lin, Wesley Dela Cruz, Madi Nguyen, John Nguyen, Aditi Rana, Catherine Rasgaitis, Sheikh Fazal Hassan, Muallima Bahiyya, Jumana Fathima, Khanh Nguyen, Arhan Jain, Anaya Pandit, Samuel Purnama, Afifah Kashif, Nika Samsavar, Dana Alsarabi, Chloe Wong, Anthony Chung, Siddharth Thiagarajan, Mike Fridgen, Grace Brigham, Jay Bartot, Diego Carreterro Alvarez, Jacquline Li, Fiona W. , Praveer Jain, Kulbir Singh, Pranav Teegavarapu, Keira Wong, Yunseo (Lucas) Lee, Rodrigo Ibarra, Noa Uritsky, Leah Jia, Jack Luo, Amal Sorathia, Krithika Satish, Nuha Qadir, Prisha Ambekar, Sia Razdan, Sam Scalia, Kevin Wu, Mabel Kwok, Margaret Li, TIm Avilov, Matt Lau, Caleb Hu, Anika Tara Rao, Kelvin Ng, Takanori Futagi, Noel Wittner, Madeline Brumley, Vera Chuang, Shakti Senthil, Walid Sheykho, Timothy Zhong, Therese Pena Pacio, Andrew Nakamoto, Ameya Agrawal, Audrey Tseng, Kevin Xiao, Nate Bek, Jack Regala, Nick Khormaei, Vanya Dimri, Iman Nilfiroush, Huong Nguyen, Swathi M. , Hugh March, Annika Singh, Vishal Canumalla, Logan Dinh, Antonio Ballesteros, Franchesca Nicole Lazaro, Andrea Chen, Nicole Sullivan, Sulaiman Shabain, Amay Bansal, Angelo Duaz, Ryu Parish, Ethan Leonard, Justin Liao, David Kim, Daniel Bejar, Jintae Cho, Megana Kommareddy, Paul Stevans, Tamara Jaber, Xavier Dixon, Chairnet Muche, Anusha Gani, Rida Khan, Dawit Hailu, Phil Bedford, Chaitanya Sekhar, Amie Touray, Lalia Baldeh, Thang Huynh (TAYYY), Richie Doan, Chanh Truong, Raiden Santos, Varun Ananth, Hans Easton, Matthew Santos, Saleh Wehelie, Yafqa Khan, Andrew Cheung, Trang Tran, Karyna, Kevin Vasquez, Claire Li, Hemil Patel, Aarav Wadhwani, Shubhi Handa, Nabilah Ahmad
& SO MANY MORE people. i'll try to update 2x/year.