Asahi Shimbun features success of Bangladeshi disabled teen

The Asahi Shimbun, the world’s most read newspaper, has featured success of Bangladeshi handicapped teen.

The report is given below for readers of risingbd.

… A computer game company has offered a job to a third-year high school student from Bangladesh who overcame a language barrier and found an activity he could excel in from his wheelchair.

Rahat MD Majidul Hossain, 18, will be employed as an eSports “parathlete” after he graduates.

He is currently a member of the eSports club at Aichi Prefectural Johoku Tsubasa High School.

On a recent day, five male members of the club were gazing at their computer screens in the middle of an empty room.

Rahat, a third-year student, offered words of encouragement, saying, “We’re counting on you,” and “You’re doing great.”

Rahat has been using a wheelchair since the age of 3, when he was injured in a car accident in Bangladesh.

Unable to find a school in his home country that could accommodate his wheelchair, Rahat studied under a private tutor.

He came to Japan 10 years ago because of his parent’s work and attended an elementary school for the first time.

However, he could not understand Japanese and started his school life communicating in basic English.

His first encounter with Japanese games came when he played Puzzle & Dragons on a smartphone that he borrowed from his father.

When he was hospitalized for a month for an operation on his leg, he became further absorbed in the gaming world by playing a PlayStation Portable console that his mother bought for him.

As a junior high school student, he played wheelchair basketball as part of his rehabilitation. He dreamed of joining the basketball club, but he could not make the team.

“It was impossible for me to do such a thing,” he said.

Instead, he played videogames at his friend’s house.

Rahat entered the high school in spring 2017. But since the school had just been established, it did not have any clubs in its first fiscal year.

In summer last year, the school’s principal, Satoru Kaneko, 58, established an eSports club for the students.

Rahat’s friends asked him to join the club.

In the semi-weekly club activities, the members play the popular online game “League of Legends,” in which a group of five help each other invade an enemy’s territory.

The members all said that their intense concentration on the game made them extremely tired.

The five third-year students decide which roles to play and devise a strategy based on their research on rival clubs at other schools before a competition.

Rahat now speaks Japanese fluently and has a part-time job as a telemarketer.

“Rahat inspires others in the club,” said Yuya Suzuki, a 32-year-old teacher who serves as the club’s adviser. “Sometimes he cheers up other members or is scolded because he gets carried away.”

After one club activity, Rahat talked with his classmates as they moved down a hallway. When they neared a staircase, the three students carried his wheelchair.

Rahat said, “Thank you.”

Helping each other has become natural for the young gamers.

“I was able to continue because my teammates have been with me,” Rahat said.

In October, he received the full-time job offer from the Nagoya company, which develops and sells online game software, after it knew about the school’s eSports club. As a “parathlete,” one of his task will be to participate in eSport-related events held by the company.

The last competition of his high school days started on Nov. 23.

“eSport is a place where I can show off my skills,” Rahat said. “I hope that it will become more and more popular toward the future.” _The Asahi Shimbun

Dhaka/AKA