Tom Amwai: Teacher who gave up profession for the love of chess

In 2005, while at the then Chepkoilel Campus of Moi University in Eldoret, Tom Amwai watched his roommates play chess.

They were so good at it that they would spend hours just looking at the chessboard, deep in thought, as each tried to outsmart the other. This fascinated Amwai, who was a football player.

“First year, second year, third year, I didn’t have any interest in chess. But somehow in my fourth and final year, the bug bit me,” Amwai says.

One of the roommates, who used to play for the university, had a chess book that he studied. Amwai found this intriguing. He made a copy so he could see what his roommate used to spend much time on.

“I still have a photocopy of that book.”

Amwai gained interest, learned the game fast and enrolled in a tournament at the university, getting his first win against a lady player.

“I was very happy even though I lost the rest of the games,” he said.

After completing his university studies, a Bachelor of Arts in Education degree, he went back to Nairobi and started teaching his peers the game.

Once they caught up, they would play chess the whole day – from 8am till 10pm – sometimes skipping meals without realising it.

“An entrepreneur saw this as a business opportunity and started selling us pasua, so that we would forget there were other things to do,” Amwai reminisced.

Pasua is slang for a sliced mandazi with chips as a filling.

“A friend used to prepare strong tea for us to go with the pasuas.”

In 2008, Amwai got a teaching job in Magadi, where he taught chemistry and mathematics.

That interrupted his chess games for a while, mainly because there was no opponent to play against.

He taught for two terms before leaving for another teaching job at New Light Senior Girls in Kitengela, where he remained up to 2013.

“During that time, I wasn’t playing chess, but once in a while I would attend chess tournaments mainly to watch,” he says.

He tried introducing chess at the school – where he was the games master – but the idea did not take root.

Later, Amwai got together with a friend to offer tuition for learners, but they ran into trouble after the government banned paid-for remedial classes.

The tutors turned the Marvens Library and Education Centre into an adult education institution.

It was at the institution that his first student – Alvin Mbithi – was interested in chess.

Amwai offered to train him.

“We helped him do Class 8, Form Four and he even went to the University. He was a strong chess player and became a national chess champion,” he says.

“However, Covid came and he had to relocate from Nairobi to Machakos. My business partner relocated to the US and I had to close shop because I could not do it alone.”

He decided to dedicate his time fully to chess.

Being a teacher earned him connections and Amwai would secure jobs teaching chess in schools for one-, two- and three-hour sessions.

Depending on the school he went to, the chess master would make between Sh1,500 and Sh4,000 an hour.

“I gained experience while teaching chess and was working towards getting certified as a chess coach. I did that for almost one year,” he says.

With time, Amwai started approaching schools and selling his idea. After landing his first job using this approach, the referrals started coming in – and he was always busy teaching chess in schools or in learners’ homes.

The now certified chess coach says the game – his bread and butter and through which he pays his bills and educates his children – has seen remarkable growth in Kenya.

“At that time, when I was starting, it was hard convincing someone to pay for chess lessons. I remember most of the coaches then used to train Indians because they used to pay good money, even Sh4,000 an hour,” Amwai says.

That was in 2014.

The tutor would walk long distances to reach schools, only to earn as little as Sh500 for a three-hour session.

Chess was considered a sport for the elite because of the expensive nature of the facilities needed like chessboards.

“It is very challenging in terms of preparation. It takes sacrifice and dedication. Sometimes I train students who become better than me,” he says.

But the tables turned and Amwai now has his own chess school, Marvens Chess Club, where he has employed coaches to train students. He has also invested heavily in chess materials, which are distributed to the coaches in his employ.

“Today, I get a coach and assign him a student to take them from a certain level to the next. The coach then will have to do their own research and find ways to improve the student,” Amwai says.

Chess pays well today, he adds, as some people have turned down job opportunities to concentrate on chess coaching.

Further, the Chess Kenya Federation has done a remarkable job demystifying the game, which has now been incorporated into the CBE curriculum.

Competitively, the sport is categorised into amateur and title players.

Titles recognised by FIDE (the International Chess Federation) include candidate master, FIDE master, international master and grand master – in that order.

Kenya has mostly candidate masters, but even these are fewer than 10, and two fide masters.

“We don’t have an international master yet and I’m really working hard to ensure we get our first.”

Despite the costly requirements, which have hindered many Kenyans from pursuing an international master's, Amwai feels obligated to train local talent to achieve the feat.

To get to that level, a competitor has to win European tournaments, which are also expensive.

“Imagine a tournament runs for a month and you have to attend. It means you have to pay your accommodation fee and meals for the whole tournament.”

However, there is hope as some of the players get sponsors.

Amwai encourages people from all walks of life to participate, saying even those in the slum can rise to become among the best players.