Ato | African Community

Interview with Ato - a soccer player from the Hong Kong Happy Valley Soccer team

Name: Ato Benin

Age: early 30s
Period in Hong Kong: Migrated to Hong Kong for 5 years
Marital Status: Single
Occupation: soccer player
Languages spoken: Fanti, English, limited Cantonese

Migrated to Hong Kong for 5 years, Ato Benin and his friend, Anthony have been working as a soccer player in the famous Hong Kong Soccer team – Happy Valley Athletic Association (HVAA), which is also known as Happy valley in short.

As we approached these two very cheerful- and approachable-looking football players (we didn’t know at first) who were sitting in K-11’s podium square (a small area outside the mall), we did not anticipate the in-depth and exciting conversations that we have eventually been able to carry out and elicited. After introducing ourselves to them formally, Ato smiled and said that he is very willing to help us to answer our questions and engage in our interview. He gleefully showed us his green backpack which has their football club’s name – HVAA printed on it. And immediately, we know that they are not ordinary people but famous football players in Hong Kong. Throughout our conversation, we have been able to elicit some interesting and useful information from Ato. The interview can be categorized into two main categories: language use and attitude, his worldview and mentality and experiences in Hong Kong in which he compares and contrasts the mentality of Hong Kong people with that of Africans. There are also some interesting findings from our interview with him.

I. Language use, preference and attitudes

When we asked Ato whether he knows how to speak Cantonese, he answered us “siu siu” meaning a little bit (his accent is quite accurate). “I don’t know mandarin, but it’s easier to speak and it’s useful,” he added. He told us he watches a lot of Kung Fu movies in America and that was how he started learning his Cantonese from. He also commented that he wanted to have a Chinese/HK girlfriend who can teach him Cantonese formally. He thinks Cantonese is a useful, “good” language and he “loves this place (Hong Kong).”

He said in general, there is not much difficulty for him to communicate with people in Hong Kong and he cited the example of purchasing food in the traditional Chinese markets, since he loves cooking a lot. When he goes to the Chinese market, he simply points to the item that he wants to buy and he said the owners will put it on the scale and say the price in Cantonese. However, he said it is not difficult because he is familiar with the “money” (price) of the items and non-verbal communication like body gestures help. He can sense whether the price that the owner told him to pay is right or wrong because he has been buying things in the market for a long time. The way that Ato and the market owners address each other is to call each other “Peng Yau” (meaning friends) in Cantonese, which helps to establish a friendly relationship between them.

However, there were times when Ato finds things that make him feel bad regarding his interaction with Hong Kong people. He said that the “old school” people (meaning the elder generation), “the way they talk to me is different, compared to the way you talk to me.” When some local Hong Kong people pass by him on the street, they will “close their nose and mouth when they pass by” as if they were strangers and they “smell.” Another bad experience is that he takes a bus and no one would sit beside him, he said even now, people try to avoid sitting beside him. He feels bad with these experiences. “We are all human beings, no one’s perfect, some people smell, some people don’t, I don’t smell because I respect myself” – he concluded his experience with this strong statement. From this, we can see that what he has experienced is not language barrier, but social barriers like being segregated by the local Hong Kong people, avoidance and discrimination. Ato feels sorry that Hong Kong people do not have a broad mentality and he comments on the Pearl TV documentary which is shown on the television every Monday, Tuesday and Saturday – they only show the village areas of Ghana; however, the beautiful places in Ghana were not featured, which is bad because Hong Kong people will watch the documentary and assume that those village places are all Ghana has. It will give Hong Kong people a biased, negative impression of his home country; thus, the people from his country – the Africans.

Regarding his interaction with his African friends in Hong Kong, he will use Ghana to communicate with his African friends who are from the same place, Ghana as him and English to communicate with those who are from other parts of Africa. Every country in Africa has its own language he said – for example, in Nigeria, Igbo is spoken and he does not understand Igbo. When asked whether the Africans will speak pidgin English, he said it depends on the person. “Nigeria people will speak pidgin English” – pidgin English is what they learn from school, and even if one is not educated, they can still speak pidgin English. Pidgin English acts as a common language (lingua franca) for them to communicate in Nigeria.

II. View towards the African Community in Hong Kong

Ato says that most of the Africans in Hong Kong are doing their businesses in Tsim Sha Tsui and their major businesses are clothing and food. Most of their businesses are opened in Chong King Mansion, Tsim Sha Tsui.
When we asked him whether he thinks that the African community in Hong Kong should be strengthened or not – to have more government support and resources and the like, he said that the African refugees would complain; however, they are not refugees so they will not have an issue. He points out strongly that the Hogn Kong government should educate Hong Kong people’s mentalities, so that they will have a more open-minded view on Africans and other language minorities – mainly on people with black skin.

III. Comment on Hong Kong people’s mentality and comparison with his home country Ghana

Throughout the interview, Ato and his friend Anthony have been constantly emphasizing on the different mentality that Hong Kong people have from his home country. He said he felt sorry that the conservative mindset of Hong Kong people has hindered their communication between him and the local people in Hong Kong which prevents them from getting closer and knowing each other more. In regards to the conservative mindsets he think that Hong Kong people have, he cited a few examples from his daily encounters with Hong Kong people to us.
The first experience took place after one of his football games with his team. Ato saw two local Hong Kong girls and as he passed by them, they said “hi” to him and he replied by saying “hi” to the girls. Soon, he knew that they are his two teammates’ girlfriends. All four of them – his two male teammates and their girlfriends are Hong Kong people but they were born in Canada. The two girls’ parents are from Hong Kong, “but their mentality – they’re different,” Ato commented. He commented that Hong Kong people are very conservative, especially the elder generation.

Another experience is when he took a bus and a Chinese-looking man who was with a 4 year-old boy talked to him. The Chinese man greeted him by saying “hi” and told his son to greet him “hi” too. Ato felt very happy that they were so open-minded and friendly to him. He said that when we come to his country, there will be “no racist or discrimination.” His parents will welcome us by saying “what do you guys wanna eat and do?” Sometimes, he feels bad that some Hong Kong people are very close-minded and not welcoming, but he said there is “nothing [he] can do” but to put it in his mind and forget them afterwards.

The last experience he told us was when two Hong Kong girls approached him in exactly the same spot we were interviewing him, asking him whether they can sit beside him. Ato asked them, “Excuse me, are you from Hong Kong?” She asked him “Yes, why do you ask?” Ato explained that he was confused because he knew that Hong Kong people will not want to sit with Africans, because they are “blacks”. Later, Ato found out that the girl who asked him if she could sit beside him were born in Hong Kong; however, she travelled around the world and has gained a lot of international exposure – “their “mentalities” are different,” Ato commented. “I do coaching, some of them are 15 to 16-year old teenagers and they’re all born in Hong Kong. But their parents, they travel, so they’re nice with me, they will talk with me, ‘hey coach!’,” they also joke around and are very friendly to Ato.