Meet the Team

Zani was born in sunny South Africa and speaks Afrikaans and English. Zani has been interested in teaching and education since she was able to dream of a profession. She is interested in the physiology and psychology of people, and has made it her mission to make people smile. Zani taught biology to high school students for five years while doing her degree in psychology, and has taught in Japan for one year as an English conversation teacher. She has spent time living in South Africa, England, and Japan. One of the craziest things Zani has done is jump off a cliff into shark-infested waters…thinking back on that makes her question her sanity!

Alex was born and raised in London, and has had a passion for languages from a young age. He grew up bilingually with Greek and English, studied German and Russian at Oxford University, and in 2012 was named Britain’s most multilingual student after being tested for fluency in 11 different languages: English, Greek, German, Russian, Afrikaans, Dutch, Spanish, Hebrew, Catalan, French, and Italian. He now lives in Valencia in Spain, where he teaches intensive language courses online and blogs at www.rawlangs.com. He is also an organizer of the annual international Polyglot Conference (www.polyglotconference.com) and co-founder of the Polyglot Workshops (www.polyglotworkshops.com).

Allan Hiscock was born in Pretoria, South Africa, and is a native speaker of English. Afrikaans is his secondary language, and he is also studying Japanese. He is an avid reader, cook, and cinema-goer and enjoys traveling (when he has money to do so!), and is also a nature lover. So when he’s not home reading, he’s outside hiking. Allan attended the Crawford College in Pretoria, as well as the South African Chefs Training and Innovation Academy. Allan has also taught privately for a couple of years, worked as a script editor for a television show, and has been teaching exclusively for a company for the last two and a half years. He has traveled through Africa and a little through Europe, and lived in the UK for two and a half years.

Annemarie was born in South Africa, in a small town called Port Elizabeth. South Africa has 11 official languages, and she speaks two of these: English and Afrikaans. After graduating university with a degree in English and a postgraduate degree in media and journalism, she moved to London for two years, where she had her first taste of big-city living. She returned to South Africa, settling in Cape Town, where she built up her career as a writer and copy editor for several magazines. She moved to Tokyo in 2013 and worked as a school teacher for eight months before picking up her career as a writer and editor again. She is still trying to learn Japanese!

Chesney Morris was born in Cape Town, South Africa. He studied physiotherapy at the University of Stellenbosch. He speaks English and Afrikaans fluently, and some basic Japanese. He enjoys learning about different cultures, especially their foods. His love of the outdoors started with athletics in primary school. He still enjoys running and hiking very much. He has been teaching English in Japan for the last year and is excited to help you learn Afrikaans too.

Liza was born in South Africa, in a small town about an hour from Johannesburg. She lived there until the age of 11 when her family decided to make a significant change and move to New Zealand. She’s fluent in both English and Afrikaans and is always trying to improve her Japanese. She loves traveling and learning about different cultures, and that’s what eventually brought her to Japan after graduating from university in New Zealand. Although she was scheduled to arrive in Japan only two days after the Great Tohoku earthquake in 2011, she decided to follow through with her plans and experience life in Japan.

Christine was born in Pretoria, South Africa, where she grew up bilingually in Afrikaans and English. She is an avid traveller when she has the time and money to go exploring, and loves to pick up pieces of new languages and explore the roots of words along her journeys to who knows where. Growing up in Abu Dhabi, UAE, she studied French, Spanish, and a bit of Arabic in school, and went on to study French Language and Literature, along with Psychology and Sociology, at the University of Cape Town. In Abu Dhabi, she was always surrounded by a wealth of cultures where she became interested in people and their languages. She has tutored French and Afrikaans privately for a few years and hopes to continue inspiring people to learn languages using arts and other creative means for the rest of her life.

Dewan Osborne was born in the provincial capital of Pietermaritzburg in South Africa. He lived there the majority of his life and obtained a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Dewan has been residing in Japan about 1 year and 3 months to date and recently subscribed to JapanesePod101. He works as a part-time English teacher in Yurakucho. His hobbies include reading, watching Netflix, and traveling around Japan.

Christa is a native South African, born in the province of Mpumalanga. She lived for several decades in Pretoria, the administrative capital city of the country. Of South Africa’s 11 official languages, she is fluent in Afrikaans and English and can speak rudimentary Zulu and Northern Sotho. She’s a qualified school teacher, with numerous certificates in special needs teaching, complementary medicine, nutrition, journalism, and more. Her interests are diverse, which shows in her work history. This includes stints as an interior decorator, an English teacher in South Korea, an editor, writer, and reporter at a medical publication company, and running her own Biofeedback natural health practice. Currently, she is working full-time as a freelance writer, editor, and proofreader.

Delia was born in Johannesburg, South Africa. Out of the country’s 11 official languages, Delia speaks Afrikaans and English fluently. Graduating with a Masters in Afrikaans literature in 2020, she is highly passionate about South African stories and culture. Delia is a teacher in Pretoria, and she has tutored children up to the first year of primary school. She also has experience lecturing in Afrikaans at the University of Pretoria. Although she enjoys traveling, she also enjoys living in South Africa and can’t imagine living in any other country.