GLOBALink | Meet "Grandpa Shimada": 75-yr-old Japanese and his 2nd hometown Wuhan

WUHAN, Feb. 28 (Xinhua) -- He owns a Japanese curry restaurant in Wuhan and has strict standards for making curry.

When he was young, he was a backpacker and traveled to many cities across the world.

He finally decided to settle down in the central Chinese city of Wuhan 13 years ago.

He is Shimada Koji, a 75-year-old Japanese, whose young friends in China call him "Grandpa Shimada."

Before he came to China, Shimada Koji had worked in a law firm in the Japanese city of Fukuoka for more than 30 years.

During that period, he met and helped some students from Wuhan.

Knowing that Wuhan had a large number of college students, he had long been eager to see the city himself.

The curry restaurant, which was cheap and cheerful, soon became a hit among college students, local people and tourists.

As more and more students came to learn Japanese from him, Shimada Koji began to teach Japanese in the restaurant for free.

Shimada Koji lives in a small room of 20 square meters, in a residential community for university faculty.

He doesn't have much furniture, but keeps a great many books. Most of his books are about Chinese and Japanese societies and economies, as well as the history of Wuhan, in Chinese or in Japanese.

He spends a lot of time reading and also writing his own books about Wuhan and China.

He lives a frugal life but donates generously to some local schools.

By 2020, Shimada Koji had lived in Wuhan for 10 years.

It was a special year. Before the Spring Festival, Wuhan was hit by COVID-19 but he decided to stay at that time.

He was living with a friend's family and was taken good care of.

In September 2020, he obtained his foreigner's permanent residence ID card, or the Chinese "green card."

Produced by Xinhua Global Service