In den Caspo-Hallen im Hintergrund hat Sultanaliev über viele Jahre Kickboxworkout-Kurse gegeben. © Michael Schwettmann

Integration through sport “When I water a plant, I expect it to grow.”

He spoke little German when he took up his studies at Ruhr University Bochum. But thanks to sport, Koshoi Sultanaliev managed to integrate quickly nonetheless.

When he first came to Bochum, he found things difficult at times, as Koshoi Sultanaliev writes in a long thank-you email to the Bochum University Sports Department. But in sport, none of that mattered, and so he made friends and learned the language.

Koshoi Sultanaliev initially came to Ruhr University Bochum from his home country of Kyrgyzstan to pursue his Bachelor’s degree. He’s currently studying for a Master’s degree at the Faculty of Economics and works in management consultancy.

Emotional email

For almost nine years, the martial artist was an instructor at the Bochum University Sports Department. We asked him what made him join university sports and what his former students will always remember about him.

You recently sent an emotional email to the Bochum University Sports Department. Why did you feel the need to do so?
Koshoi Sultanaliev: I felt grateful, plain and simple. And merely saying thank you wasn’t enough. The email was the only way I could communicate my affection and gratitude. It allowed me to express how important it was for me to be part of university sports.

Excerpts from the email to the University Sports Department

“It was a long time ago, but I can still vividly remember my first conversation with Christian Sendes. [...] I had applied to be a kickboxing coach, but my German was still poor, and to convince Christian I said: ‘I can’t speak German all that well, but I’m much better at boxing’.

Since then, university sport has grown and I grew with it. The courses and being an instructor have helped me to grow as a person. [...]

When I came to Germany, it was a foreign country for me with a foreign culture and foreign people, a foreign language. Accordingly, I also felt like a stranger, and sometimes I struggled a lot with everything.

But the gym at the university sports centre became my comfort zone, where I was part of the group and part of the community, despite my lack of German, because we all had a common language, namely sport.

Here, I was able to socialise, improve my German and make friends. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that the courses at the university sports centre helped me to integrate.”

What attracted you to university sports when you came to Ruhr University Bochum some nine years ago?
Sultanaliev: I came to Germany from Kyrgyzstan on a foreign student visa. One of the conditions of the visa was that I was only allowed to work a maximum of 20 hours a week. That wasn’t enough for me to make ends meet.

A friend pointed me to the University Sports Department and I found out that the hours I work there are not counted as part of the maximum 20 hours.

You don’t need words in the gym.


Koshoi Sultanaliev

I’ve been doing martial arts since first grade. Until fifth grade, I practised Taekwondo. Here in Bochum, I boxed at PSV Bochum and also competed in a few tournaments.

Tell us what made working as an instructor at the university sports centre such a rewarding experience for you.
Sultanaliev: The fact that communication here doesn’t necessarily have to happen through words, but through interaction with the students. I didn’t speak much German at first.

But you don’t need words in the gym and we were all equal, regardless of our language skills.

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What do you think will your former students will always remember about you?
Sultanaliev: I actually have a pretty good idea, because they gave me the perfect goodbye present: a plant.

I used to say from time to time in my course: “When I water a plant, I expect the plant to grow.” I asked my students to reflect briefly the morning after a course on what they had learnt in the course.

I enjoy it more when I see them grow. I feel it’s wasted energy if all they do in the course is sweat. They should also learn and grow.

I was always happy when I saw a student flourish. I would then support them specifically.

Christian Sendes leitet beim Hochschulsport Bochum den Breitensport und das Kursprogramm. © RUB, Kramer

Interview with Christian Sendes

Which role do exercise instructors like Koshoi play in university sports?
Christian Sendes: I consider the exercise instructors and trainers to be the key component of university sports. They are the face of university sports.

I knew very quickly when I met Koshoi that he’d be a great fit for the coaching team. In addition to his excellent qualifications, it was his manner and the way he talked about himself and his idea of sport that won me over.

I never considered his German language skills, which were not so good at the time, to be a problem, because we have always offered courses where the instructors taught in English, for example.

Besides, practising (university) sports together is precisely the place where the lack of language skills becomes less important and where instructors and participants can support each other.

The pandemic was also a challenging time for university sports. Is everything back to normal now?
Sendes: The coronavirus pandemic was indeed the greatest challenge I’ve experienced in university sports throughout the years.

As the university sports department, we tried not to bury our heads in the sand during this time and started to set up an online programme at first, later adding courses that allowed participants to socially distance – always in accordance with the requirements of the respective Coronavirus Protection Ordinance.

This meant, of course, that we couldn’t cover all aspects that make up university sport. Social interaction during the courses, as well as before and after, was possible only to a very limited extent.

Semester with the most participants ever

It is all the more gratifying that university sports can now once again take place without restrictions and that we've managed to bring the programme back up to the pre-Covid level in a very short time.

It looks like by the end of the summer semester, we’ll probably have organised the programme with the highest number of participants ever.

If you add to this the many registrations on the waiting lists of people who unfortunately didn’t get on their desired course, then it becomes clear how much everyone has longed to engage in sports together with others once again.

Published

Wednesday
21 June 2023
10:38 am

By

Tabea Bouchemit (tbt)

Translated by

Donata Zuber

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