When Jamie Pi arrived in Australia at the age of 12, he had no English, no friends and no idea about AFL.

Twenty-one years later, footy is his religion and the thing he says “changed his life”.

Pi’s father, a chef, moved to Australia as a skilled migrant in 1993, with the family settling south-east of Melbourne.

“I was born in a small city in the outer west of China. When I say small, it’s probably got about nine million people,” Pi said.

“We landed in Dandenong, the first stop for many migrants. If you compare it to Sydney, it’s probably the same as a Cabramatta.

“It’s a real melting pot full of different cultures and we landed there without a word of English.

“As a young teenager it was hard. I moved to Dandenong High School at the end of ’93 and straight into Year 7. That’s when I was first introduced to football. Before that, every time the footy was on TV, I’d just switch channels. 

“One lunchtime I saw the boys playing footy on the oval having a kick-to-kick and I went up and asked one of the boys if I could have a kick. 

“He told me later on the only reason he let me have a kick was so the other boys could step on me and take speckys.

“It’s not a different story to many kids in Australia but for someone who just came out from China, to be exposed to that, I think that really changed my life.”

Now more than 20 years later, Pi said it was the simple feeling of being part of a team that began his love of AFL all those years ago.

“I’ve been playing since ’94 until now, this is my 21st season. It’s a love affair to last this long and it continues to grow on me every single day,” Pi said.

“At the start it was the overwhelming feeling of inclusion. When you’re in the situation I was in - a young kid who spoke rough English and didn’t have many mates in Australia - your neighbour sort of took you in, having a kick with you even though you don’t speak great English. 

“We couldn’t converse properly at the start but we were able to having a kick. From there, you walk into a footy club and straight away you’ve got 20 mates. 

“You’re just included without any prejudice whatsoever because you’re having a go, you’re on my team. I think that’s powerful ... This is why footy is so popular.”

While footy has given Pi a lot, he has also given a lot back to the game. He was one of the founders of the Southern Dragons - a multicultural club playing in the Victorian Amateur Football Association.

He also works as an AFL Multicultural Ambassador, is the coach of the Chinese national team at this year’s International Cup, and was the first person to call an AFL game in Mandarin when the Brisbane Lions took on the Melbourne Demons in Shanghai in 2010.

“In Melbourne, going back eight, nine or ten years, at a suburban level there weren’t really that many Asian faces on the footy field,” Pi said.

“There were a few of us that played against each other in the Amateur’s League, we’d see each other and always have a good banter because we were the very few Asian faces. 

“From there it morphed into why don’t we try and start a footy club to get more Asian boys to come and try the game. 

“We started the Southern Dragons and began with 20 blokes. Now we have four teams and 120 on the list.”

As the AFL celebrates Multicultural Round for the fourth year, Pi said it was an important event on the football calendar.

“Australian Football is one of the front runners in world sport to celebrate diversity like this - to nominate a round of home and away season to put the focus and the spotlight on multiculturalism and how it helps the country,” he said.

“I’m really, really proud to be part of that. It is important to me and it helped me and as part of the ambassadorial program I’d really like to get more people involved - to like footy, watch footy and be part of it.”

The GIANTS take on Geelong at Spotless Stadium on Saturday night as one of the main events of Multicultural Round. 

Pi will have an important role on the night, calling the game live in Mandarin on Muse Sydney Chinese Radio 87.6 FM.

“The purpose of doing this is not so that we can tick off that there’s been a game called in Mandarin but to encourage GIANTS fans, Geelong fans, football fans ... to bring your transistor radio so you can listen to the game and get an explanation of what’s happening on the field so they can follow the game and learn the game,” he said. 

“From there, as a commentator I hope they’ll come back and watch the next game and they’ll watch games on TV. 

“Hopefully big Jezza (Cameron) can kick a bag and forever be known in the Chinese community as ‘The Man’.”