Expat in China designs phone app for easy language pickup

Bulgarian Seso Nikolov has designed the Volock.

After observing how so many people fiddle with their cellphones in China, Seso Nikolov, a Bulgarian man from Xiamen, Fujian province, came up with the idea of an application that will assist learners of foreign languages.

The 27-year-old, who works as a salesman for a local lighting company and also as a part-time English teacher, came to China in 2012 to study international business at Xiamen University.

"I saw 90 percent of the people on a bus doing something on their phones. They were reading a book, using WeChat, which is Chinese-made phone messaging app, or playing games," Nikolov said.

According to him, on an average, a person spends about 30 minutes a day "taking out" the phone from either a bag or pocket, indicative of the obcessive nature of cellphone ownership in China.

But to him, the time would be better utilized by learning a foreign language. So Volock, whose cellphone app that's integrates as a screen locker, was born as an idea in July.

As an English language trainer, he is fascinated by the vastness of China's language education industry and the amount of money that's being spent. At present, the Chinese reportedly make up the world's largest group of English learners.

Nikolov, however, thinks that rote learning should not be encouraged when learners fail to remember words in foreign languages.