Foreign student embraces tai chi

Practicing a series of gentle tai chi moves, Khamisi Ally Abdi feels his body warm up in the morning chill.

The 25-year-old student at Cangzhou Technical College, in northern China's Hebei province, has practiced the slow-moving traditional Chinese martial art for two years and is now a huge fan.

Idolizing kung fu stars like Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Jet Li and Donnie Yen as a child, the Tanzanian thought of kung fu as a fast-paced attack and defense art before he arrived in China. "Tai chi is different from the Chinese martial arts that I watched as a child. It is slow. But the more I practice, the more I realize that the slow motions are far from simple," Abdi said.

The college offers the tai chi course to all its foreign students. Abdi has already developed the balance and deep rhythmic breathing tai chi requires. This allows him to fully experience the discipline, which calms the mind while building and toning muscles.

Ma Congying, deputy director of the college's International Exchange Center, said that some 300 international students from 50 countries have enrolled at the college since 2016, mainly from Belt and Road countries.

While learning tai chi, Abdi has met many kung fu fans from Africa and Asia. As a result of its rich history in martial arts, Cangzhou was named the "Hometown of Martial Arts" by sports authorities in 1992.

"It was my parents' wish for me to study international trade to better prepare me for job opportunities in the booming trade between China and Tanzania. But it is my own dream to chase Chinese martial arts," Abdi said.

Through practicing tai chi, he has acquired a comprehensive appreciation of Chinese culture and ideology and now prefers that people call him by his Chinese name Chen Yanzhi, as the characters in "Yanzhi" convey the meanings of "talented" and "virtuous".

"Tai chi movements are tranquil and quiet but full of power. It has inspired my understanding of China, which has the same temperament. My mother felt the same after she visited me here," Abdi said.

He said his Rwandan classmate likes to post videos of them practicing tai chi on social media, and a Cameroonian classmate has learned to improve his boxing skills through the art. "When I return home, I will use my Chinese name to teach tai chi in my country, so that more people can benefit from this magical kung fu," he said.