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Learn how to order food in Chinese, what not to gift a Chinese person on their birthday, and even how to lie in Chinese – all in Darija (Moroccan Arabic) – through fun and entertaining videos on Oussama El Harti's Instagram. To his students and the thousands who follow him on social media, learning Chinese with Oussama is easy.
But that wasn't his opinion years ago, right after he graduated from high school. Born and raised in Salé, Oussama now lives in Guangzhou, a sprawling port city northwest of Hong Kong on the Pearl River. Back then, he found Chinese hard and saw no point in learning it.
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His journey with Chinese began when he intended to enroll at Mohammed V University in Rabat to major in English studies. «When I first graduated high school, I was planning to study English at uni. Unfortunately for me, many other students wanted to do the same, and I ended up on a waiting list for weeks», he recalled.
The note than changed his life
After weeks of waiting, Oussama was ready to accept a gap year. When the university administration returned his file, it included a note from the dean that read «Apply for the Chinese studies».
As a Plan B and an escape from a gap year, Oussama decided to enroll with the Chinese Studies department, a field he didn’t even know existed. «At the time, I thought to myself, ‘Why would I study Chinese? What am I going to do with it?’»
To his surprise, studying Chinese turned out to be more fun than he had expected. The first year was enough for him to stick with the curriculum. «One of our lecturers was really good and nice, and she made us love the language and Chinese culture», he remembered.
During his first year at university, Oussama had the chance to travel to China on a scholarship. He stayed there for a semester, immersing himself in the culture and improving his language skills.
Back in Morocco, he earned his bachelor's degree and set off on a new adventure: learning how to teach Chinese to non-native speakers. This endeavor required him to return to China. «The only solution was to come to China to pursue studies in Chinese. The master’s degree lasted for two years, from 2016 to 2018, and it focused on teaching Chinese as a second language», Oussama told Yabiladi.
After his master’s, Oussama worked in China at a private school, teaching Chinese to children born to foreigners settled there. In 2020, he decided to broaden his work experience and leave teaching, taking up roles in business, mainly for companies running Chinese apps online. However, his passion for teaching never faded.
Learning Chinese in Darija
One of his videos speaking Chinese on social media attracted many comments from fellow Moroccans eager to learn the language.
«Many people in the comments were like, ‘Please teach us Chinese, we want to learn Chinese.’ I thought, ‘Okay, but I need to clarify something.’ So, I made another video explaining that I could teach them Chinese because I have a background in teaching and the academic qualifications to do so. That video went viral on TikTok, with many comments expressing interest in learning Chinese,» he explained.
As teaching is his passion, Oussama excelled in his videos, using methods he had employed with his students in the past. «I used to teach kindergarten pupils, and formal, old teaching methods didn’t work with them at all. We had to teach them through games, and that’s the same approach I’m trying to use in my videos,» he said. «It’s not exactly games but rather stories, sketches, and fun situations».
His videos on his Instagram page, «chinesebdarija», have garnered him over 150,000 followers, many of whom are Moroccans interested in learning the language. «In my videos, I try to teach Chinese in Darija, which is something I haven’t seen any other Moroccan doing on the internet, and it's fun and entertaining», he noted.
Through his content, Oussama advocates for young Moroccans to consider learning Chinese. «Chinese is a very important language. Millions of people speak Chinese worldwide, and many big tech companies are Chinese, so it opens up new horizons», he noted.
Oussama is planning to expand his horizons as well, aiming to start studying business while continuing to create online videos teaching Chinese in Darija.
