Largest tennis courts in Yaoundé. It seems a long time ago when Yannick Noah overcame Mats Wilander, in 1983 after 2h25 of fierce struggle, and lifted the Coupe des Mousquetaires by winning Roland-Garros. Since then, the former sportsman has become an artist and has offered many cult titles. But what some didn’t know was that Joakim’s dad has completely changed his life 5 years after his father’s death. “VSn Sunday morning in Yaoundé, Zacharie Noah left us, peacefully in his sleep. He left surrounded by all his family., he wrote on his Twitter account on January 8, 2017 to announce the sad news as noted by our colleagues from Here.
Since then, he has decided to return to the land of his childhood, in Cameroon. Our colleagues from Brut find the former tennis player in Yaoundé, a place where he calls himself “Papa Yannick” and works a lot to help the inhabitants. “This is where I grew up […] I am the patriarch of what used to be a village and now it is one of the neighborhoods of Yaoundé”, he reveals quite proudly before giving more information on his role: “You take care of the little ones, you take care of the old ones. And then from time to time for the youngest, it’s a beer”. “I left here I was 12 years old. So I was a little kid. I was playing tennis […] and in fact, I left 48 years. I came back from time to time and then all of a sudden I had a call”, he remembers nostalgically. Today, he wants to make up for lost time and above all “protect the land which is my land, which is the land of my ancestors”.
Although he feels a lot of happiness in this new life, Yannick Noah does not hide the difficulties he had to face to “reintegrate”: “I had to start learning again, to understand at least the local dialect. It’s a real responsibility but I’m a fighter”.
RF
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