English teacher overcomes race barrier

Liu Minxia

mllmx@msn.com

AFTER teaching 12 classes, Kenyan David Jim showed no sign of fatigue at 9 p.m. June 22. Clad in a red T-shirt and carrying a black backpack, he said he was as energetic as he was at 4 a.m., when he usually gets up.

“I’m used to it. At the beginning I was very tired and my voice was gone when a day ended. But now I’m totally used to it,” said Jim, 26, who has worked as an English teacher in Shenzhen for four years.

“The classes start at 9 a.m., so I get up early to prepare for them. Education here is different from (that) in Kenya, where even kindergarten teachers rely on textbooks to teach. Here, when you teach the small kids, they don’t want to listen to what you say. Instead they expect to enjoy the class, to sing or dance or play games.”

Before coming to Shenzhen, Jim worked as the head of the English department at an international school in Kenya, following his university studies. Jim visited Shenzhen in 2012 on a business trip and met a Chinese person who managed schools that were looking for English teachers.

Jim struggled with the job in the beginning because of his skin color.

“The students and the parents thought a good English teacher must be white,” said Jim. “ Every morning I went to the schools, the students and their parents looked at me in a funny way. It was a big challenge before I was accepted, believed and trusted.”

Now seeing that experience as a stepping stone to become a better teacher, Jim said it feels good to be accepted and liked by the students and the parents. Jim’s diligence also helped make his life in Shenzhen easier. He said he knows by heart all the bus routes and Metro lines and became proficient in Chinese within only two and a half years without attending classes.

“I downloaded an app to my phone and with the help of that I taught myself Chinese,” Jim said. “I tried to listen and repeat the pronunciation of the equivalent of every English word, and I also wrote down the pinyin to help me memorize it.”

Now speaking Chinese well, Jim said he can communicate without difficulty. He has begun to buy electronics from Shenzhen manufacturers to sell in Kenya.

“Sometimes in life people may lose hope. I like to talk to them and tell them they need hope and they need to see that something will be better tomorrow,” said Jim. “They just need to be focused and work for it.”