Now 27, Zouaï first arrived in San Francisco from Paris when she was just 3 months old. She grew up in the Outer Sunset and lived in the city until the age of 18. As a teenager, she was always interested in music, and considered attending Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts instead of Lowell, known for its high academic standards.
"I was debating going to the School of the Arts or to 'the smart people school,'" Zouaï said, but a 4.0 at Herbert Hoover Middle School led her to Lowell. "I knew that if you go to school for music you could get turned off from it in a sense, so I didn't want to lose my creativity.