The Diary Of A CEO with Steven Bartlett - Francis Ngannou Breaks Down Sharing Heartbreaking Story: "I Don't Know The Purpose Of Fighting Anymore", "I Feel Powerless", "I Don't Know How To Deal With This!"

Episode Date: August 8, 2024

Crossing oceans, deserts, national borders, and finally the entrance to the UFC ring, you've never heard a journey like Francis Ngannou's  Francis Ngannou is a martial artist, professional boxer, and Lineal Combat Sports Heavyweight World Champion. He became UFC Heavyweight Champion in 2021 and holds an MMA record of 17 wins and 12 victories by knockout.  In this conversation, Francis and Steven discuss topics such as, Francis’ painful childhood, how Francis worked in a sand mine aged 10 and dreamt of boxing, his struggle to find a place to train, and the death of his 15-month-old son.  (00:00) Intro (02:13) My Childhood: Surviving on Less Than $1000 a Year (06:17) Overcoming Struggles in Rural Cameroon (12:52) My Dream of Becoming a Professional Boxer (14:59) Choosing a Different Path Than My Father (17:27) Growing Up with a Violent Father (18:11) Coping with My Father's Death at 15 (19:57) Wishing for One More Day with My Dad (24:22) The Struggles Of Chasing My Boxing Dream (25:30) The INSANE Journey to Reach Europe (28:41) How We Survived the Sahara Desert! (32:47) The Hardest Part of My Journey (34:59) Waiting to Cross the Border (36:53) Two Ways Out: Swimming the Ocean or Climbing the Barbed Wire Fence (42:15) Six Attempts to Cross the Sea in a Dinghy (49:02) Months of Survival in the Forest (50:56) Evading Police Radars (58:26) Calling the Red Cross for Help (01:02:60) Two Months in a Detention Center (01:05:07) Surviving on 50 Euros (01:07:49) My Coach's Support: A Place to Stay and Guidance (01:10:15) My First Experience with MMA (01:11:12) Facing Rejection: No One Wanted to Fight Me in Paris (01:12:40) How I Made It to the UFC (01:14:20) My First Fight in America (01:16:04) Winning the UFC Heavyweight Title (01:21:10) The Conversation with Dana White (01:24:31) How the Contract Took My Freedom (01:27:44) The UFC Contract and Its Clauses (01:29:40) Tyson Fury vs. Francis Ngannou (01:32:41) My Future Goals in Fighting (01:34:53) Ads (01:35:51) The Truth Behind the Anthony Joshua vs. Francis Ngannou Fight (01:43:17) Coping with the Death of My Baby Son (01:47:29) Going Through Grief (01:52:37) Returning to Cameroon (01:59:05) The Last Guest Question Follow Francis:  Instagram - https://g2ul0.app.link/1NxVsZgZPLb  Twitter - https://g2ul0.app.link/LLWRzrkZPLb  Watch the episodes on Youtube - https://g2ul0.app.link/DOACEpisodes  My new book! 'The 33 Laws Of Business & Life' is out now - https://g2ul0.app.link/DOACBook  You can purchase the The Diary Of A CEO Conversation Cards: Second Edition, here: https://g2ul0.app.link/f31dsUttKKb  Follow me: https://g2ul0.app.link/gnGqL4IsKKb Sponsors: ZOE - http://joinzoe.com with an exclusive code CEO10 for 10% off Colgate - https://www.colgate.com/en-gb/colgate-total

Quick one. Just wanted to say a big thank you to three people very quickly. First people I want to say thank you to is all of you that listen to the show. Never in my wildest dreams is all I can say. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I'd start a podcast in my kitchen and that it would expand all over the world as it has done. And we've now opened our first studio in America, thanks to my very helpful team led by Jack on the production side of things. So thank you to Jack and the team for building out the new American studio. And thirdly to Amazon Music, who when they heard that we were expanding to the United States

and I'd be recording a lot more over in the States, they put a massive billboard in Times Square for the show. So thank you so much, Amazon Music. Thank you to our team and thank you to all of you that listened to this show. Let's continue. Just getting tired, being tough was the purpose of fighting

if I would end up not being able to fight for the only person that I could fight for. Presenting Francis Ndado! UFC Heavyweight Champion of the World! I was 13 years and I decided that I was going to be a professional fighter. But I have no money. We don't have shoes. We don't have food. There's not a gym. I have to do something for that dream.

So I left Cameroon. You need to get to Spain. I was reading that people died. A lot. And you were drinking water that had dead animals. We had no choice. I attempt in the ocean. I fell six times. I tried to climb the fence, but that while it was the toughest part. Why didn't you give up? When your dream is so big, it's hard to give up. And the day that we arrived in Paris, I could start that dream to become a world champion. You left the UFC because of a disagreement

with Dana White. What's the truth? Easy. He didn't want to. And then you fought against Joshua. Honestly, on that fight, there was a lot of unfairness. What do you mean? They have a lot of tricks. Do you think they were doing that intentionally? Yeah. He was so messy. And then life shows

how cruel it's capable of being. When my boy passed away, that was the moment that I really felt like I could fail you. Have you been able to grieve? The Diary of a CEO raffle is about to close. Anyone that subscribes to the Daira Vaseo before we hit 7 million subscribers, which is probably going to be in a couple of days time,

you will be included in the raffle. And on the day we hit 7 million subscribers, we are giving away a lot of Money Can't Buy prizes to all of you. So hit the subscribe button, get in before 7 million, and I'll announce the prizes and the winners in the comments below when we hit seven million subscribers

francis we met in a hotel room in paris it was me you thierry omri and chemi and several other people and um i knew you from tv i'd watched fight, but I had no idea about your story. And it's funny because we all went around one at a time, Thierry, me, and then you, and shared our early story. And when we came to your story, I just couldn't believe it was true. I couldn't believe it was true.

Really? Of course, I'd never heard, and I sit here and interview people for a living. I've never in my life heard a story like that from where you started to where you ultimately ended up. And I know you've told it before to some people, but I have to start there because I think it creates the context of everything that you are today and the man that sits in front of me. So if you take me back to West Cameroon in 1986, what would I see? What was your childhood like?

I think you will see two parents that are just struggling, making it. A dad who was a carpenter and then a mom that really didn't have a job and then at some point she she was doing whatever she find whether it's like selling uh cook some stuff and sell in the in the trade so that's that was it in back then back in 1986 the average person lives on one thousand five hundred dollars a year in west cameron that's what i read oh that's a lot oh really one thousand five hundred a year that's a lot of money how much money were your family living on a year? A year? Oh, definitely less than that. Less than a thousand for sure. And you're in a village of about 11,000 people? Yeah. I mean, yeah, maybe back then. I think now we are over 20,000 people or 30,000 people now.

I found some pictures. Take a look at these pictures. What are these different pictures? Can you describe them to me, what they are? This is me and my mom in our kitchen. Yeah, this was when I won the UFC title. And then I set it there on purpose. Like, you know, I've been sitting in this kitchen since when I was a kid. So dreaming about boxing and everything. So I got to go out there from this kitchen, go out there, get that belt of a world champion and bring it back and set it in that same kitchen and sit in the same spot that I used to sit there.

Now I'm like, at the end of the day, not only everything is possible, it's not such a big deal. You know? For anyone that can't see this because they're listening on audio, with all due respect, it looks like the floor is mud and the walls are mud and bricks yeah so it looks like a mud hut yes that's that's how we build house because it's the lesser cost you want because you make like a mud to make to make bricks with it's not like a brick with sand and cement. It's just a mud. So it's like a mud hut?

Yeah. And you're sat there on the floor with your mother? No, on the floor, on the chair. I mean, I wouldn't call that a chair, but it's a piece of wood. It's a chair. A piece of wood, which is a chair. You can sit in the piece of wood.

It's very comfortable. Was this a happy childhood? No. Absolutely not. But for some reason, I think regardless of everything, I owe who I am today to my childhood. You know, as much as I hate my childhood,

I was so mad, so upset about it since we didn't have the minimum necessity. Like even like toothbrush, stuff like that, you know, book to go to school, even like a petrol to put in the lamp and learn. We didn't have some time sometime like you see the fire there right on the picture yeah the fire where we are cooking on the wood sometime you're gonna take your book there and read it like this like so this is just a fire you've made with a bunch of wood and some rocks and you would go and read by the that fire so you can see your book? Yeah. We cook. They put some food on top of the bricks

or the stone there to cook. And then, meanwhile, you're using the fire, the flame, to light up and read your book sometime. What made your childhood so unhappy, though? What was it, other than the poverty? The difficulty, the challenge of everything uh as i said like we miss everything uh most of the time we a lot of time we will be walking barefoot because we don't have shoes uh or we will be like uh fixing shoes in 10 in thousand ways

you know to still have issues our pants will be having holes all over and we will still try to do. We will go to school, be embarrassed because maybe sometime we don't have a pen or pencil or notebook or haven't paid school fee and they're going to kick us out from the classroom. So all that stuff was embarrassing, not to mention like when come a break time you don't have something to eat uh unlike your peers the other kids you know you just around on your own so it was a lot of thing everything uh was a challenge and that's why like when sometime i'm like you people that are being very comfortable never been in the struggle i'm like oh money doesn't make happiness money blah blah blah i'm

like give me the money and then keep the happiness because i have been without money and i know what it feels like all day long i prefer being money. You're really describing the comparison that causes the unhappiness between yourself, your family, who you guys were, and the other kids. Yes, absolutely. I mean, how many times do I get sick and didn't have a pill? Couldn't even go to the hospital. We couldn't even have a pill from around the street. A pill?

Yeah. And then you're just home, sick like this, hoping, having some prayers, maybe luckily sometime go in the bush and find some remedy to cook and hopefully that it works. But you can't afford. What were you eating during that time when you didn't have the money? We would farm corn, beans, peanuts, stuff like that, yam, cassava, veggies, stuff like that. Is there a moment you look back on your childhood

and think, that was the worst moment for me growing up? Just a memory or something that happened that you think that was the worst moment for me growing up just a memory or something that happened that you thought this was really the the bottom for me i would not say the bottom i mean regardless of everything i think um i was lucky and uh i think i was gifted to be able to handle that the proper way. You know, when I look at it today, I'm impressed of the way that I handle it. And even without knowing where that would lead me, where I was going with that, I just handle it like find a way out.

But I never like feel like a bottom. You know you know in fact like one of my biggest motivation came out of that situation like uh i was around 13 years old and it was someday around 3 p.m they kicked me out of the classroom one more time and i think that day i was pissed. I was very pissed. Almost crying. Like, okay, what the hell is this? What do I do to deserve this? Why is this so unfair? And then the look of the other kids on me, I didn't stand that either. Therefore, it was now a challenge. I promised myself that I'm going to change that.

I'm going to prove them it's not my fault. I was just a child, just as them. Who doesn't have the same opportunity as them? Just we couldn't have a parent that can provide for them. But, in fact, the minimum that I had, which wasn't enough, was something that I worked for, I earned. I know the value of it. And even though they have more than me,

they didn't earn it, you know. They gave it to them, but they didn't earn it. I started to work in the sand quarry. I was nine years old. Which was a sand mine. Yeah, sand mine. And what are you doing? You're using a shovel to pick up sand and put it in piles?

Yeah, pick up sand or dig sand on the mountain. So, I mean, I know that. I get to realize that even though I have less, I work for those less and I work hard for that. And even though they have more, they don't really know the value of what they have. So in fact, I'm not beneath them. In fact, I'm quite superior.

Why were you kicked out of the classroom that day? When you were 13 he was i think he was uh scholarship that that exact same day i think was scholarship uh the fee the school fee oh okay so you kicked out of school because you didn't have the money yeah because i haven't paid the annual fee i haven't complete the annual fee and uh yes that day it was it but know, it was the same thing over and over, this year, next year, the year after. And that day, I think it was a signal. And I'm like, this is going to change.

But the problem now, I was in the situation that I needed to do more than others to be noticed. I wanted to prove to them that the perception that they have of me is not who I am. I'm better than that. And yeah, so I was 13 years. And that's the day that I decided that I was going to be a professional fighter, professional boxer. It was the day that I really decided.

Growing up, I want like karate, I want this, I want that. But I get to the point that I want something that not only will be my passion, but at the same time will provide for me and help me to provide for my family as well. And then I come across like, okay, boxing, combat sport is the thing to do. But problem, I'm 13 years old. There is not a gym in-mile radius. And I never saw a gym before then.

And even after that time, I think I stayed in the village until I was 22. It was the moment that I'm like, okay, enough is enough. I can just be dreaming. I have to take action. I have to do something for that dream then I leave the village I move to the city I move to some place that I don't know and then just like say everything that I have to start boxing and I was 22 at that time. I've heard you say as

well about your father my whole life my father was the example for me of what not to do yeah i think that's the best thing that ever happened to me because if my dad wasn't what he was i could have been what he was but i still love him a lot yeah because again like from my perspective um he's the person that affected my life the most. He was violent and then I happened, but he wasn't capable of canalizing his energy, his strength or know how to use it. Then maybe if they have an argument or something, usually at times people were fighting a lot,

but he was stronger, so he basically ended up beating other people. So it makes them the victim and him the guilty, right? And then he has a reputation because when you get in so many fights in the hood and you're winning any fight, so you're just a bad guy. You know?

So he has that reputation from people who don't really like his behavior. And then that's something that I understand really quick and then will have affected me. I didn't want to have that reputation. Although I like everything uh that

related with power i was very into it but i'm like no no way they are talking to me about my dad basically like the divorce i was six years old so i started go live with my aunts and these and everywhere they'll be like yes you just yeah he's doing that he's like his father he must be like his father stuff like that and it pisses me off like so bad like i don't want to be have that reputation even though i like everything with strength power fighting you know then that's how like i ended up finding those boxing, combat sports staff. It was the right thing to do because there was rules. There was rules.

It was organized and everything was right to do. And it wouldn't affect your reputation. When you get into a boxing match or character fight, you win. You're a winner. They celebrate you. They don't blame you from beating somebody he was a violent man outside of the home but also inside the home yeah a little bit to you and your mother we would get some we would get some spank

i mean in africa uh at that time that's kind of uh thing was happening a lot into a lot of families. So he wasn't something, nowadays things are a little different, but he wasn't something that was very different, you know, just so he was kind of like straight, straight guy. Was he violent towards your mother? Sometimes, sometimes it could happen. He passed away when you were 15 years old? Sometimes. Sometimes it could happen. He passed away when you were 15 years old? Yeah, he did. How did that impact you at 15 when he passed away? You know, he wasn't a big part of my life at that time.

But yeah, you get affected. You think about like your dad and the fact that you will never see him again, you know, time to time for months. You think I am like, man, so this is it. And yeah, he affected you a lot. I mean, you're hurt, but just have to keep rolling. When he passed away,

he couldn't afford to go to the hospital. Yeah. He was sick. He was at home for months. Sick, just stay in bed. Couldn't even go out to the toilet on his own. Anything.

He has one leg that was rotten. out to the toilet on his own, anything. He has one leg that was rotten and was just there like that until he died. And that was something that I look at it and I'm like, man, I think I need to do something. I need to take action because this kind of thing might happen again in the future or to my mom or to somebody close,

and I will be powerless. And no, it doesn't have to be like this, you know. So that was one of the reasons, like just being safe, be at home, and to die. Maybe we could have saved him if we had money maybe he could have still be alive if he could have go to the hospital but nobody knows and nobody will ever know a couple of years after i was looking at my mom and i asked myself if she ever got sick what would I do? And it scared the hell out of me.

At that point I knew I had to do something to at least be able to provide her some decent healthcare. I always wonder what it would be like if my dad was still alive today. I wish I can have him in my life today even just for a day yeah well uh after my dad uh passed away and then I think that was also a shock of our situation I realized I mean I was 15 by the time I know that our situation wasn't good. We weren't living in a good condition, but that was like an eye-opening, like, okay, this is how bad it is. He didn't go to the hospital for months. I was going there time to time, and he was suffering,

in pain and everything. He didn't go to the hospital. And even when he passed away, I kept having nightmares of seeing him like in pain screaming at night stuff like that and i'm like this is not happening again bro like it was tough right so uh now that was not only like i was thinking that when I grow up, I will have a family and I will want to provide to them and then get them in a good situation, in a better condition.

But that was like, okay, there's something that can happen again. What would you do? It could be, yes, it could be your mom. It could be one of your siblings. Or it could someday be your own it could be one of your siblings or it could some day be your own kid what will you do like just sit there and no i need to do something so that's what i i took actions you know and then uh yeah in the other hands seeing where we were when my dad passed away, I always wonder, like, what would it be like if he was around?

If he could turn around and see us, what would he say? Like, how would he feel? I mean, it's always, and I miss those moments that I replicate our family a lot. You know, growing up, we never have to eat in the dining table like this. We didn't have a dining table. But for the past year, I've been replicating that. Like I will have, we have nice house with table, dining tables. And sometime I will get there and then regroup everybody in the table.

And then even though I don't speak, I look at that table and know that somebody is missing. There's one person missing. You know, we could have been there to make that a perfect table. You know, even though it's quite enjoyable to be with those who are there, it's still like a blessing to have them. But it's still sad not to have one person there. You start dreaming.

At that very young age, you start dreaming of a different life. And I was reading that you were pretty obsessed with America. You were signing your signature San Francisco. Not like obsessed. I love America. I always love America. You were signing your signature San Francisco? No, like obsessed. I love America. I always love America. Like since I, I, uh, I named myself American boy. I named, I give myself a nickname of American boy. When you were young? Yeah. Like kids around will call, will call me American boy because I tell them that's my name.

And at 17, you said that you left that small town. Is it called Betty? Betty, yes, the village. And that's the village that you left. And you, um,

you moved to a different town. You went to Cameroon's largest city where you started boxing. Yes, Douala. Why did you leave? It wasn't at 17. At 17, I left,

uh, I abandoned school because I couldn't continue. Ah, okay. So you left school at 17. It was at 22. Okay. So 22, you decided you wanted to move city. Yeah.

Had you ever been to a gym before? No. When was the first age you went to a gym? A boxing gym? Yeah. Kind of. 22. 22.

Yeah. When I left the village to go find one. Why did you end up leaving Cameroon? And what age was it when you left Cameroon? I left Cameroon, I was around, I was 26. Around 26 when I left Cameroon. Why did you leave? Well, I knew that I couldn't make it there as a boxer.

Because I started boxing and I know the reality there. I know the truth. Even before I started boxing, I knew the reality. I knew that it can happen there. I need a big stage. I need somewhere that there's more boxing is well developed. Where did you want to go? First it was always America but from Cameroon there wasn't a way

to come to America, I wasn't going to swim to the Atlantic Ocean so the easiest way the more paved way was to go to europe so april the third you're 25 26 years old um 2012 which doesn't feel like it was that long ago 2012 is when i left it was 2012 yeah that's when i left that's when i left my secondary school. And at that time, you were leaving Cameroon. Yes.

And your objective was you were going to try and get to Spain or get to Europe? Yes. So you were going to walk from Cameroon to Europe? It wasn't work. I mean, from Cameroon, I was in Douala. I took a bus to Yaoundé, and then I took a train to North Cameroon. And then we started to take a, how do they call it? Clando?

Like a lorry? No, no, no. Small car that they know how to avoid police station and all the stuff on the road. So that's how we get from Cameroon, North Cameroon to Yola in Nigeria. And then Yola to Kano and then Kano, Niger. So you traveled from Cameroon to Nigeria, to Niger, to Algeria. To Morocco. To Morocco. To Morocco.

Yeah. And then how did you get through the Sahara Desert? We were lucky. Our group didn't have so much of a trouble. Even though it was 25 of us in the back of a trouble. Even though it was 25 of us in the back of a pickup truck. Yeah. But we made it.

The truck didn't broke up. We get it all there safe. People die. Oh yeah. A lot. Like all the way, you will see like skeleton around skeletons skeletons in the desert and just look all the way all the way like no you'd see skeletons and look away yeah how how do you afford

where does the money come from to get go on this journey to get out of cameroon and to try and get to europe because it must cost money yeah from the beginning, the beginning is not so hard because it's something that you prepare for for years. You don't just wake up one day and go like this. You prepare for, you don't know how much you need, but you know that the much that you can have, you can use it to go. So I have some savings that I've been saving for a little while. I took some with me and I gave some to my little sister to keep it ready in case I call. Because I didn't know where I was going. And then we have heard that there's a lot of smugglers on the way.

So you better don't carry all your money on you. So as much as you're going, you're going to call and then they will send money until it's over. And then you start to figure it out on your own. You say it so casually, but what is the reality of that of that journey you know i was reading that you were drinking at times drinking water that had dead out dead animals inside the water yeah when we first crossed the desert uh we get to south algeria in a tamaracet we found a water well, and it was almost dry.

There was a little water that was there for months. There were dead animals and all the leaves. Everything was inside the water. But we were so dehydrated because our water finished in the desert hours ago. So at times, the water didn't look good at all. It was pretty bad. But I think the philosophy right here was like, okay, whether I drink the water

and if it has to kill me, it kills me later, or I just die now by dehydration. I think when that's the only two choice, it's easy to choose one. Die now or die later, later. What does all of this experience do to you as a man, in terms of your resilience and attitude towards life? You probably don't even know because you just are the way that you are, but you must see that you're different from other people in the Western world.

I think in general, in Africa, we are quite different to the Western world. We have more, not that in the Western world people don't have hardship, but we have, mostly, most of us, we have hardship and toughest one for the most part. You know, like, because in the Western world, you will not see, it's not very often that you will see kids that have experimented famine. You know, like going to sleep without eating or something.

I think the West is more designed to stay away from those kinds of troubles. You might not have a home, but you can still have something to eat. But in Africa, most people, they will not even have that and then the good thing and i think the difference that i found so far is that in africa you know from your early age that you're not counting on nobody you're not expecting anything from anybody it's all on you. And as long as you get that, the rest of your life gets better. Because you go out there and figure it out.

But you go in a lot of Western countries and then even though coming from where you come from, you see that there's a lot of opportunity and people are still there sitting complaining we don't have this, this should be like that this should be like that you'll be like man, this is like

more than all what I need you know, because you're at the point that you don't need you don't just need what can be given to you. What will be given to you is just a way, is a, what could be given to you is just a way for you to, a bridge to help you get where you're going

because you have set your goal way beyond what you can get. How long does it take you to get across the Sahara Desert? Across the Sahara Desert itself, it took one day. One day. Again, we were lucky, our car didn't break up. So they drove for about, I I think 20 or 22 hours. And eventually you get to Morocco and Morocco from Morocco you need to get to Spain which is difficult. That was the toughest

part I spent almost one year in Morocco. Trying to get to Spain? Yeah trying to get to Spain I did a lot of attempt in the in the water and also in the fences. When you were living in Morocco, where were you staying? Wherever you find, in the desert, in the forest. It depends on what you're looking for.

For example, if you want to go to the fence, trying to fence, to escalate the fence, which is in Melilla for the most part. Then you have to stay in the forest of Gorogo.

It's like living in the forest between trees, you know, and then you hunt. What are you eating? What you're eating, everything that you find. Sometimes there are people that can make trapped and try get some animals but uh for the most part we will wait night time to go to the market

because the police is always around you know the undercover police we will wait for the night for night time go to the market go to the market trash and then find like rotten rotten stuff like that they throw away whether it's tomato potatoes um chicken legs because they didn't eat chicken legs who was the best thing for us so we will find stuff like that in the trash and go back in the forest and try to make a meal. When we don't have money. At that time, were you trying to figure out, learn how to get to Europe? Were you trying to learn the best way?

Because I can't imagine, or did someone tell you how to get to Europe? There is a lot of people there that is trying to do the same thing. It's not just you. You left your house by yourself but by the time you get to some point you start meet people that are in the same journey and by the time you get in morocco there is a lot hundreds of people are you training at the time are you trying to stay fit yeah sometime in the forest i mean you have nothing to do you do push-up you would do some apps but otherwise what would you do and you were still dreaming of being a boxer even though you were yes that was that was the thing

i mean that was my motivation i think if he wasn't about that, I wouldn't have left my country. He was just about that. I never thought about anything else. So that was the reason why I left. How did you know you'd be good at it? I didn't know. But he was about to find out. I didn't know at all.

I had no idea. I could have been very bad i could be good so he was just about to give it a try and if he doesn't work then at least i try you know i think it's the it's the most important thing is to try and give it all and if it doesn't work, then, well, we reset. There's two ways to get to Spain. You can go over the wall or you can go across the water, through the sea. Yeah. And across the water could be very… Dangerous. Dangerous and difficult sometimes.

I tried a couple of times. Did you try the wall? Yeah. The barbed wire? try the wool yeah the barbed wire yeah i tried above i have a lot of scar on me a lot of barbed wire scars on me really those are barbed wires those you see my fingers yeah my finger into like on my skin you will find on my stomach here, on my feet. I fell. I tried. I have a lot of that. I tried to, I attempt in the ocean, like six, I fell six times. What happens when you try and go over the barbed wire fence?

Is it, do they catch you? Where the spot that we pick, because it's about like 12 or 14 miles of fence with barbed wire. So we will have like an outlook guide that will go, walk around all those fence, and then like trying to identify a spot that there is not too much barbed wire, or that the barbed wire has fell, you know. And when there is not a lot guard, because there's guard on the Moroccan side and there's guard on the Spain side.

And some way there's like three fences and then barbed wires on like maybe the first one or the two. There's not a chance that unless you can fly, you cannot go there. And it's like seven meters high. Seven meters high. Seven meters high.

So it's not possible with barbed wires. Without barbed wires, yeah, that's good. And then they clean the surrounding of fences. So the guy has to stay far from the distance to try to identify if there's a failure of barbed wire somewhere. So it's very difficult. And there is a police, a Moroccan,

on the Moroccan side, there is like boxes of guard in like an interval, I don't know, maybe 20 meters. Every 20 meters there's a guard? Yeah, every 20, 30 meters there's boxes of guard. Sometimes some boxes can be empty. But from where we are, you don't see need somebody to go there like a week every time read everything monitor the um um uh all the information you know like the the post the the guard how they've been um the schedule yeah how they've been changed because it's permanent but one person doesn't stay there 24 hours you know i think it's

like eight hours so you have when he spotted a spot that there's not too much barbed wire then he'll be like okay there's a outlook very far there is the outlook from the spend side very far and then these boxes is there guard inside he might take him days to just find out if those boxes have guard. Someday he's going to go by and then wait. They can stay in the same spot for like two days just to wait. And then when the truck comes to change shift. For the guards to change shift. Yeah, for the guard to change shift. For the gods to change shift. Yeah, for the god to change shift.

And then he will see which box has the god and which box doesn't have. And then what time they come and this, what time they go, if they pray, what time they go to pray. And you need all those information before prepare a attack. And eventually you prepared an attack for the fence. Yeah. And sometime you prepare the attack.

You see all those, you collect all those information. Then as you are getting closer to the fence, you realize that there was a barbed wire. You couldn't just see from where you were at. You know? Or that maybe there's someone that is in the floor. They dig like five meters long like this, wide, and then they throw barbed wires all the way.

Then you ran by maybe 30 meter or 100 meter. They can see you coming. They know that you're coming. Now you are taking advantage because you are in a group of people. And then you get closer and then you find like five meter barbed wire.

You can jump five meter. It's not possible. You know, so... So what do you do? You run back? You run possible you know so so what do you run back what you run back or some by the time you run back this uh if it's a group of you some people will fall in the back wire because they didn't see or maybe you're in the front line you see but you can't go back because there are people a mass behind you coming they might just push and then you fall inside the barbed wire. Did you ever try and climb the fence?

And did you get caught? Yeah, I tried to climb a fence. I get out of those barbed wires on the floor once. And that was the time that I fell in the barbed wire. I tried to climb the fence, but the barbed wire on the fence was... Painful. Big. the fence but the barbed wire on the fence was painful big like i was trying to hold it and he was just catching my face like i'm like oh okay i see like so and um i get to the point that i'm like you know i'd rather be alive without being in europe instead of being dead in

europe like wait it's gonna be another time it's not possible so you eventually decide that you want to go via the sea in a boat you're going to try and take a small little dinghy yeah that was that was um i mean even before i tried the barbed wire, the first thing that I tried, it was a boat. And why did that not work? I mean, it's not like the boat is a small inflatable boat that you can use in your swimming pool, stuff that they use in the swimming pool. We call it a dinghy.

You can put it in the swimming pool. You get it in Walmart. In Walmart. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So that's a, you tried to cross from Morocco to Spain in one of these small inflatable boats. You couldn't swim? No, I don't know how to swim.

But guess what? I ended up being a captain. Captain of the what? Of the boat. Because you still need a captain. You still need somebody to organize, somebody that knows how to paddle, somebody know where we are going, somebody know how to organize like for 10 people to get in the same boat from going from the ground to the ocean.

And then like how do they get all those organization. And then I practiced, I did it so many times that I become an expert. And I still don't know how to swim. You tried six times to get across. What happened in those six times? Sometime we get caught. The majority of time we get caught. And what happens if you get caught?

They send you back to the desert. They send you back to the desert? Yeah, to the desert. Not to Morocco? No. You are in Morocco. You get caught by the Morocco guard. Yeah, but then they just bring you back to the city or something?

No. Because they have been financed to protect people from the Arab border. They have been financed by the European Union or something like that from holding you guys down there. So every time that they catch somebody, they make a report of that person that, okay, we caught somebody and then we send them back out of Morocco.

They will just bring you to the Algeria border in the desert and throw you guys there and you will figure out your way. So they throw you back in the desert without food every time you got caught? Yeah. I mean, it's pretty, pretty horrible. Why is life and even till today, there's people out there still doing the same thing. And even though it's getting harder and harder, I don't know how they do, but I don't want to find out.

It's horrible. So you would, but then you went back again and tried again for a seventh time. Why didn't you give up? You've tried the fence. The fence doesn't work. You've tried crossing six times in a small inflatable boat. That doesn't work.

Why don't you give up? What for? Give up, go back to cameroon maybe live in what for go back to what don't i get a job in camera in morocco uh why couldn't i why shouldn't i try again? It was all about trying. And I think when your dream is so big, when you have something, it's hard to give up. You get to the point that you're capable of risking more for just a dream,

which is something that a normal person would not understand. Like, I just ask myself now, like, why didn't I give up at that time? Why did I keep doing this? Why did I take those risks? Because there was a moment that even now I think about it, I'm like, that was stupid. It was like a death sentence. You just get lucky from coming out

there alive you know but i took those decisions your dream was so big that he uh blinds you you couldn't see any anything else except what you have not what is in front you cannot see anything in front of you except what you have in your mind you could only see what is in your mind and regardless what is in front of you what uh the obstacle is in front of you you can only see what in the front of in your mind and it couldn't nothing could stop you and what was that in your mind that was pulling you? Dream. Dream to make it, to go have that boxing, you know,

that boxing career, set up a stability for me and my family and my potential kids so they don't have to go to what I've been through. You know, and my potential kids so they don't have to go to what I've been through. So I knew that if I gave up, I wouldn't be able to look at myself in the mirror like this. It would be a shame to live with myself. I couldn't live with myself. It was hard.

You thought about it. You think about like, oh, maybe, maybe there's not a way. What for? Like going back and then maybe not really have something to do. And someday you see your child get sick and you feel powerless. Just ask your parent where to you. And like, no, that's not happening. And then the seventh attempt was

successful yeah take me take me to that seventh attempt of getting across the sea to get to europe you you get in the boat there's you and a couple of other men you start paddling the sixth attempt was close to the winter. Okay. We get caught. And I was this close. We were already on the other side. We get caught by an army. It wasn't even like the, I don't know how, the Coast Guard. It wasn't even the coast guard.

He was the army with a big ship, and they were just passing by, going somewhere. After three hours inside the ocean, we were paddling. We knew that we are getting there, and then we get caught. Back in Morocco, they knew that we are gone. We made it. And then at that time, it was close to winter. The winter was coming.

The water wasn't stable anymore. We couldn't attempt anymore. And for me, it was that I tell myself that the day that I'm touching the ocean again, I'm not coming back, ever. I don't know exactly what I was willing to do, but I'm like, it's not happening. This is it. My frustration was top to the level so we we recruit back in the forest trying to try fences or just stay there during the winter because the

water I mean yes you can try some crazy stuff, but only when you see that there's an ounce of a chance. But when you look at the oceans, the big monster rising up with those waves, you know that you cannot go through. There's no way. No, you can't do that. You can't try. On a small inflatable boat.

And then it's cold. It's freezing. So I think what was even scary the most was the cold. You would just get frozen out there, you know. So I stayed in the forest for like months, months. And once when the winter was touching the end, I had a friend that people, he was in Tangier. And then he reached out to me.

He said, I have a ship. Let's go. I couldn't leave Tangier. I did everything. I get to the bus station and there was so much police and this. I didn't want to end up in the desert, in Oujda.

I'm like, okay, just. And then the next day, the next day, we are running from the police from 4 a.m. to like maybe 4pm. We came back to our spot. I opened my phone. I saw

like 12 missed calls. I checked and then he was like Eto'o made it. Eto'o was the guy that was calling me. I'm like damn, I could have been making it too with them. Did they get, they got with them did they get they got to Europe yeah

they got to Europe like bro come on I couldn't sleep there anymore and I have a lot of call and people was like yes we want you to be our captain you this that that that I'm like I'm going you know and I didn't want any promises like oh we're gonna do this buy a uh boat in one week or no i have a guy that we've been talking for a long time he said i have a boat already i'm like let's go so you get on a boat an inflatable boat i heard that you wrapped yourself in silver foil no no i didn't. But I was planning. We put a life jacket though. The one thing that we are very strict about is a life jacket. Yeah.

I didn't, but because over time, you learn a lot of stuff. And you know that those silver foil would deviate radiation from like, you know, they have the radar. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So if you wear the silver, then the radar can't find you. Yeah, the radar can't find you. It can't see you. Because when the radar is going like this, and then he see like, I think it's infrared or something. And then he see movement, he will like, peep, peep, peep, peep, peep, peep, peep, peep.

But when you have that silver foil, they can see you. So that time, tell me about this successful journey. You get in the boat, not you and a few other men. No, we didn't get in the boat. I went to Rabat, which they were. What's Rabat? A city. Okay.

I went from Nador to Rabat to meet them like okay when are we going to tanger because i've been in i've been in town i i've been living in tanger for so long um until winter that i went back to to nador so they are living in a rabat which is kind of like a city and they have those little jobs of construction. I'm like, when are we going? I meet them there and like, okay, let's go there. I'm like, oh, we are still working. We are going to get paid on Saturday. And this is what went.

I think this was like Tuesday. I'm like, bro, I'm not staying here until Saturday. Bro, my blood was boiling. I'm like, man, I miss this. I could have been making it with the other guy that called me. So, their leader, the head guy of the group, he said, okay, then I'll go with you.

Because I was a captain. I need to go and check the place and everything. He said then I'll go with you because I was a captain I need to go and check the place and everything so I'll go with you the rest of people they can wait until we give everything is good we give them sign so they can come we move by the time we touched ground we are stepping down of the bus in Tangier I got sick I got a fever and we are going to this house inside mud we have to take our shoes off walk inside more to get into this house to sleep something like that and I was sick bro but I can't tell anybody that I'm sick I'm the captain and people saw me in town shade I'm like wow this guy's here he's going

to make it he's not coming back so they are trying to bribe the the guy that I was to get them in the in the group and you know'm like, no. We collect the money together to buy the boat so I can take anybody out of it. And I'm like, if, because they call me Vandam. They say, if Vandam is the captain, you guys are not coming back. You're going to make it.

And I was sick. Nobody knows. So, long story short, we've been there for like a couple days and I didn't even have any money to eat.

And then, but I check internet every day to check the weather to see how the ocean is. And it wasn't so stable. And I found one day,

I think it was Tuesday, and he was the second, April 2nd, 2013. And I say, this day is good because this is the speed of the wind. This is the direction of the wind. This, this.

I know that thing. I don't know how I know it, but by the time I knew it properly, I was a captain. So I say, tell your guy to come this day because we are leaving. By the time they come with the boat, we are not sleeping here with the boat.

We have to just be going with the boat because it's a very, even the police, when they like bus into houses, they will search for that. And they came. We get to where we were going, next to where we were going. But the police car was up there.

So we couldn't inflate here and then put the raffle inside the ocean without them seeing us. Now we have to make a detour all night long. We make a detour to go somewhere in the front. And even though I was sick, usually, Captain, you don't carry staff because they protect you for the big action, for the main action, which is inside the ocean. And then while we are making these detours, some people are being left behind and this, I'm like, bro, where is the boat?

Where is the raffle? They say, oh, it's here. It's to this guy. I'm like, bring that raffle. If you stay back, stay alone. Don't stay back with the raffle. I take that thing. And like, if somebody want to go,

he has to catch up with me and just lead the way and keep going. And all night we go up and then finally go down to the step and find a place. And it was all rocks. And I'm there. You know, we used to go to where? To the beach

so there is a sand. It's easier because like when you walk to the sand like this to go inside water and every footstep get you deeper and deeper. Now you are in the middle of rocks

and then the ocean is there. You don't know how deep is the ocean there and how you're going to get in that ocean. You can just jump like this to get in the ocean. And then the wave was so strong. You will hear like...

I'm like, damn. Was it nighttime? Yeah, early in the morning. Okay. Because we are waiting. We are aiming to do this when they call for 5 a.m. prayer. Okay. Yeah.

But we get a little late because of those day two. But I'm the captain. I'm the one that everybody's expecting on me. And he was nine of us. So I tell them, okay, with me here, let me find a place. You know, when something is yours, it's yours. I walked around and I get somewhere in the middle of rocks. I found a spot just as big as as this table enough to inflate the boat just enough no more than that and it was like this clean i touched it there wasn't anything sharp on

it just like that enough i went back and called the other guys. I'm like, let's go. They came like, okay, let's inflate the boat. Eventually the boat gets in the water, you go. Yeah. And the boat is rescued by the American Red Cross. By the Red Cross. I don't know if it was, we know there was a Red Cross base in Spain, in Tarifa. Did you get to, you got to Spain?

We didn't get there, but we know that there's a Red Cross inside the ocean. In fact, we have their numbers. So you knew there was a Red Cross there. Yeah. So you got close to Spain. Yeah. And then the Red Cross came and got you.

We get far from the Moroccan coast, but we don't know where is the limit. But we just get far from this coast and then trying to get as far as possible inside the ocean and call. But the problem is that you're in the middle of the ocean. And even though it's where lands the closest distance of the two continents, from this side, you can see the other side. But in the middle of the ocean when they say where are you what are you seeing you can really give them a

direction so sometime because their goal is just to rescue their goal is not to bring you to Spain and if they cannot find you they will even call a Moroccan course course guard for help and if you know you're locked in there, you get fined by Moroccan coast guard. You know where you're going. You're going back to work. So we paddled like for one, I think it was like hour and a half, almost two hours.

And then there was a helicopter in front of us. And he was like standing there, like he was looking about something. And I tell the guy that, okay, this is not a good sign. Whether this helicopter can play against us or it can play for us.

What we do, call. We call now. Because if they ask what are you seeing, we will see the helicopter is right above us. And then we call. So you called the Red Cross? We called the Red Cross. You called the Red Cross?

Yes. And what did you say? For the rescue. Oh, we are inside the ocean. We need help. And then, I don't know, we pick up the phone and start to ask if we have, yes, how many people?

Do you have ladies in the boat and this? I'm have yes how many people do you have uh ladies in the boat and this i'm like what the hell is this problem we are human being and i'm like yes we have ladies even kids we didn't have kids we have ladies i'm like what's that what's different that makes like you will just let off us here because like yes even kids and say okay what are you seeing you see we said the helicopter right above say okay welcome in and they found you yeah and then right after that he started rain and the water really get bad. He was moving. Now we are in the middle of the ocean in this little boat, just like this table,

and he's like going, oh, we get tired in the middle. It was nine of us. How long did it take for the Red Cross to find you? Like 10 to 15 minutes. That's quick. Yeah. And they take you?

Yeah, I think a little more, maybe like 20 minutes. And they take you to Spain? And then when they find us, because now it was a little harder to find us because it was raining and the ocean wasn't stable. You know, when the ocean is't stable you know when the ocean is

stable you can see something from far away now this is there's something crazy that happened inside the ocean like from the coast the ocean is flat when you get inside at some point bro ocean has mountain like there's a way that you're climbing and then until you get to the peak and then there is a way that you're going down inside the ocean i don't know how it works but it's exactly like that and you can see like a huge mountain inside the ocean and they took you to spain yeah they found us uh and then took us in their in their They have a real boat, you know, like solid big boat. They took us inside and then brought us to their headquarter, which is in Spain. And you stayed in Spain in a detention center in a cell with 10 or 20 other men for two months?

Yes, it was like, I think, 53 days. How were you treated? Treated. We were eating. But it was a prison though. It was quite a prison though was it quite a prison i think you get to the point that you're like maybe they should have just let us inside the ocean or maybe we were better in in morocco because you're locked you can do anything you're you realize that you had freedom even though your life wasn't the best that's when i mean you're here you're getting fit every day but they tell you where when to eat when to shower when to go sleep when to go out and everything and after like a couple weeks it started to become hard because at first you are excited. I'm like, oh, I made it.

You're excited. I'm in Spain. I'm in Europe. But after a couple of weeks, I'm like, come on, man. Like, I need my sentence now. Because you had a fake ID at one point. Oh, no. When you get caught, you make sure that you don't even have a receipt or whatever on

you so you threw it in the water oh yeah when did you throw it in the water when you saw the red cross i know when you're sure that the red cross will get you because otherwise that will be your way out in morocco sometime he can prevent you not to be thrown in the desert. When did they, they released you from the detention center in Spain? Yes. Eventually, after almost two months. And they gave you 50 euros. No, not from the detention center.

There is an association that come, charity for refugees, some organization that are out there. So they will come, take you, and then bring you to their place. And where you where did you want to go what was the plan so you're now in spain you're free you've got 50 euros so my plan first of all was to go to first i wanted to go to the uk but i knew that even though i'm in europe the free circulation in Europe would not allow me to get in the UK because they are not in that zone, in the Schengen zone.

So I think I settled for Germany because I wanted a place that boxing was big. But for somehow I was in a group of people that most of them, they were like, oh, we are going to France, oh, Champs-Élyséess Elysees oh this oh that and in the 9th of June 2013

26 years old now you arrive in Paris and I read that on your first day in Paris you figured out

where to eat where to sleep and you found a boxing gym where did you sleep when you arrived in Paris in the parking lot

you slept in a parking lot yeah how long did you sleep in the parking lot for like 2 months parking lot. You slept in a parking lot? Yeah. How long did you sleep in the parking lot for? Like two months. For two months you slept in a parking lot? Yeah. How did you, how did you, so you arrive in Paris, you're sleeping in a car park, um how do you find a gym, pay for a gym? Oh next day, I was after it so I finally get where I could start that dream that I've been having

for a decade what do you do do you just walk up to the boxing gym and say hey can I come here for free yeah basically what I walk in the front desk

and they give me this form and then I saw the price and everything and I couldn't afford it then I'm like

can I talk to a coach to the boxing coach and the lady said the boxing coach is not there today, but he has his substitute. He's there. You can talk to him. I just explained straightforward, like, okay, I arrived in Paris yesterday.

I don't have where to sleep, you know, but what I want, I want a place to train. So that's why I wanted to see a boxing coach. If he can let me train here because I have no money. I have nowhere to sleep. I have nothing. But the only thing that I'm asking for is a place to train because I want to become a world champion. Straightforward.

That was it. And he said, if you have a phone number, give me your phone number. I'll speak to a boxing coach. He'll be here on Wednesday and I'll give you a call back. That's how I gave him my phone number. I had a phone.

And then on Thursday morning, he called me and he said, yes, I spoke to the coach and he agreed that you can come and train. And the next training is Saturday. And that's how it started. Didier Carmont? Yeah, Didier Carmont.

Didier Carmont was that man that you met that day in the boxing gym that gave you a chance and he let you train for free. He speak on my behalf to the coach who let me. Let you train. Yeah. And he gave you a new pair of shoes i read that he gave you keys to an apartment to sleep in as well yes after like two months uh he gave me he gave me a key he has like one apartment that uh he was uh i think was airbnb or renting out and then he get free for a couple of years.

And at time, I think he knows me a little bit more and he gave me that apartment for almost two months. He changed your life, didn't he? Because if he hadn't have said yes, if he hadn't have introduced you to the person, if he hadn't have helped you. He helped me a lot. He helped me a lot.

Changed my life, I think is too much to say, but he helped me a lot he helped me a lot changed my life i think it's too much say but he helped me a lot um i mean we were at the gym and then he knows exactly my situation because i was uh clear to him telling him everything but other people at the gym didn't know and in fact he he at some point even tell me that you don't have to tell your story to everybody they don't need to know your situation you know like why did he help you why did he help you because he was kind he just like me and like to help me and uh hear me a lot it's because he didn't have a reason no he didn't a lot of people will have expectation that maybe at time you would not know, but later on you will find out. But he was just genuine.

He never had like expectation. You know, in fact, sometimes he's the guy that sometimes you will even call. He will not be around, shut down his phone and everything. He's always been like that. Because it was quite difficult to become a boxer in France not be around, shut down his phone and everything. He's always been like that. Because it was quite difficult to become a boxer in France without having all of the correct identity papers, he eventually suggests that you take up mixed martial arts as a way to make some quick money.

And in 2013, 26 years old, you went to the MMA factory in France and introduced yourself to a coach called Fernand Lopez and within four months I mean he saw something special in you in terms of MMA and within four months of that you had your first MMA fight yeah what did you think when you first saw the sport of MMA did you had you ever heard of MMA before no so Didier was the first one to talk to me about MMA I'm like oh yes you have a good striking if you do mma i'm like what's mma it's martial art okay good then what's that was mixed

martial art so yes it's like boxing with wrestling with this i'm like ah i think i have seen that once on the tv i was watching. I see something like that. Like, yes, if you learn some good wrestling, some takedown defense, a little bit of grappling and this. I'm like, what's grappling? So, explain the whole thing to me. And this is back in 2013, June 2013. And I'm like, bro, nah nah that's not what I want

I want you know the Mike Tyson boxing right so yes I'm like that's what I want You fought five times in Europe before you were signed for the UFC which is quite remarkable because a lot of people spend many many many many years trying to get into the UFC

you fought just five times in Europe before you were offered a chance to fight in the UFC. I didn't even, I wasn't even planning to go to the UFC. And, but as soon as I started to fight in France, then it became very hard for me to have a fight in France. People didn't want to fight me. Why? Oh, they say I'm brutal.

And I'm like, it's a fighting game. I mean, the goal is to be brutal. And then I'm not having a fight because I'm brutal. I heard your coach, he actually posted on Facebook asking if anyone in europe wanted to fight you the posters will anybody in europe fight francis yes nobody wanted to fight you i mean no anybody at that level because even though a lot of people didn't want to fight me i was still on experience so he's not like they will give, just give me to

anybody, but nobody either like want to take a risk. There's not a gain for a elite fighter to fight me. He's risking of losing everything, but not a lot, not quite a lot to gain. Were you aiming to be in the UFC? Cause you know, you knew what MMA was, but when you started becoming an MMA fighter, were you trying to get into the UFC? Because now you knew what MMA was. But when you started becoming an MMA fighter, were you trying to get into the UFC? How did that happen? I was just like, you know, training because I had time. I was jobless.

So I have all my time and I like to train. And I found MMA very exciting. I like all those stuff. So I was training boxing, MMA. And then I started to fight MMA. And sometime, maybe I will have like a couple hundred euro fighting MMA. It was very welcome at the time. So I'm like, let's do this.

But that was it. And people keep saying, oh, if you improve your jiu-jitsu if you do this you're going to become a UFC champion like then what I really like I was so focused on boxing and then um but I think like MMA came to me and gave me that opportunity and then all of the sudden I'm here, I have the UFC contract. How did that happen? How did that happen? Did they call you or your agent

or your manager? So I think Fernando, a guy that was a manager at time, Thiago. Okay. Thiago Okamura. Okay. Yeah.

And then he was the guy that was pitching me to the UFC okay so your manager your coach knew someone who was pitching you

to the UFC yeah the manager okay and then that's how I get that's how I get the UFC contract

where was your first fight in the UFC Orlando Orlando yeah was that your first time in America yeah it was your first fight in the UFC? Orlando. Orlando. Yeah. Was that your first time in America?

Yeah. It was the first time. And I remember like I get there and I'm like okay.

And there was somebody at the airport with a tablet with my name on it and

then pick me up with a Cadillac brought me to the hotel. They hired residency. to check me in brought me to my room how did it feel then I call home I call my mom I'm like I don't know what it is but I think your son has made it finally get to that like i mean like i get to america basically so that's what

because for so many years america was the dream to get in america and i get in america and in a big way not the way that i get in europe because i get in europe in the service door. I get in America basically on, on the red carpet. That was it. That was 2015. 2015. How much, that first fight, does that make,

that first fight make you rich? No. You don't get paid much for the first UFC fight? Yeah, it was $10,000. $10,000? Plus $10,000

win bonus. And then with all the commissions, you got out with almost just half. But he wasn't about the fight. He was more about like, I think me coming to America and all the stuff, he was more than what I was making in the fight. That's nine years after you left Cameroon

you fought for the UFC heavyweight championship belt and eventually you won that belt and you held that UFC heavyweight title. Yeah but I lost I fought before. Yeah you fought quite a lot. Yeah yes I fought in uh 2018. Yeah. Yeah um but won the same guy yeah I lost I've I've watched your career so I've watched the journey and it felt like for the first start of your career I don't know it felt like maybe you weren't as focused but then it felt like this this other half of your UFC career something had changed I was focused it's just that I didn't I never I never done sport before I didn't grow up as an athlete. So I didn't know how they do.

I didn't know how they train. I didn't know how they prepare for a championship. I didn't know anything. So I was just out there trying. And then in that fight, I did a lot of mistakes. And I learned from it. And I'm like, okay, the the good thing I might have lost this fight but this fight will be the biggest fight in my career because everything that is coming after

this fight everything that I'm learned that I learned in this fight I will implement that in my game in my career from now on and he will be quite helpful you have the hardest punch ever recorded by the ufc the equivalent of 93 horsepower a smart car by comparison maxes out at 80 horsepower and they called you the predator you did eventually win the ufc heavyweight title and you held it between 2021 and 2023. And eventually you left the UFC in January 2023 because of basically a disagreement with the UFC, with Dana White about, I guess, freedom and money?

Yes, freedom and treatment. The way that I was being being treated i didn't like it was there ever a moment where you realized that you'd really made it you know you're you're a young man that come from cameroon walk you walked your way out of the you know through africa and then you got on a boat and went to spain and then from spain to paris then from paris to america and then you you reach the highest mountain which is you win the ufc heavyweight title which is like the peak of fighting was there a moment where you thought i've i've made it it's not like you reach the higher mountain you know uh whatever mountain you are on top there's always then when you get in the peak of a mountain you realize there's another mountain that's higher you know and um you realize that what motivate you what keep you going

wasn't the peak of the mountain but it was the peak of all mountain so then you keep it's never a satisfaction satisfaction even though you you take a moment i'm like oh finally make it to the top you know you take a breath but you know that you keep going it's i think it's a mindset that uh you have and basically will not stop like you don't have a limit you don't have a place that you say okay if i get here then i'm done there's always something uh around there's always something which is set as a higher mountain you know so but i think um what i do is to take time you know i like to go home a lot and i like to go back on my path and every step every time i'll be there i'm like thinking of the moment that i was there like maybe 15 years ago and he would feel like he was just yesterday and I was trying to see like

where I am today you know see the different that's exactly when I realized because when I'm here I'm just living like it's normal like it's everybody like he was just like this all the time but when I get back I connect with the with the past and then I realised how far the road has been and you've you've really gone I mean it's been an incredible

has your mother ever seen you fight in the UFC has she ever been there no I tried I tried to get her to my fight back in

2019 she couldn't get a visa she get denied twice and I'm like okay this is so stressful I'm not doing it again it was also embarrassing stressful one and even for her it was very tough and i'm like okay i'm

not putting her to this again uh there will be a moment i think if i set up if I set things up pretty good, there will be a moment that things will be easier for her to see me fight. Why are you fighting? Why are you fighting now? I mean, the reason you left the UFC was because of freedom issues and you didn't like the treatment. You wanted to be free.

The argument you had with Dana, you say that essentially you weren't willing to comply with the system of the UFC where you don't really have the option to go and box and do other things. Dana White said that you're in a place where you wanted to take less risks and you wanted to fight lesser opponents for more money. So we're going to let him do that. Is that true? Do you agree with what he said? He said you wanted to take less risks and fight other opponents,

lesser opponents to make more money. I think if we have to spend time to talk about like what Dana White say, if it's true or not, we're going to spend a whole night here and then don't be okay with a lot of things. I think the situation was a little bit embarrassing for him and then he was going to make a statement and find his way out. Less of opinion. Like living my comfortable career in MMA

that I'm quite comfortable into to step into boxing to take the best for my first uh boxing match which I never really do a professional boxing match that does that sound like an easy fight I mean I think he has to say something and those who know those who know know that he has just has to say something to get out of that situation what's the truth? easy

he didn't want to compromise he didn't want to change and I feel like that situation wasn't good for me and I tell myself if

that's the end, then let it be. I mean, in fact, I had no guarantee that the boxing that I've been dreaming of doing, I will have to do it. It will happen at the time. But I didn't just want to comply

and do things that I'm not okay with just because they let me with that one option to say yes with things that I don't like. That was the thing. I was very aware that that could be it. But he has to be on my term. And even though he means like going back to Africa, you know, I don't know, farm.

I love farming. I always loved farming. And if that meant I had to go back and farm, I was okay with it. So I made my peace with myself at times, and that's why I stood with my decision. I turned down a lot of money that I didn't have

at time I was for the most part I was broke I was living out of loan so yes

You're the heavyweight champion of the world in the UFC you're broke I mean not that broke when I say

I was broke I mean for a heavy broke. When I say I was broke, I mean, for, for a heavyweight champion, I wasn't comfortable. Yeah, I wasn't comfortable.

Were you a millionaire? Maybe, but never made a million a fight. But, the most you made was 500,000 pounds? Except, except if I have accept to um to sign a new

contract i would have been having a lot of money but that contract was coming with a lot of things that i was fighting against and that's why i didn't sign so i'm like okay whatever this deal is whatever this contract is i I'm filing this contract off. Instead of renewing the contract and have more money and really have nothing changed, that means I'm setting myself up for another year in the same situation that I'm giving away all the power in a contract that is not giving me any power.

The power you wanted was freedom. Yeah, was freedom, was possibly to say, okay, this is not right. You can't do this, you know, or you have to do this. You have, I mean, I need the obligation. I don't want a one-sided contract. I don't want a contract that, okay, I have no right. But on the other hand, the other side of the table have no obligation. So in fact, I mean, I'm giving everything for nothing, just for money. I want some of that leverage. So you wanted to be able to decide and you wanted... Not like to decide, but I want at least some responsibility on the other side,

showing toward me, you know, I want some responsibility. For example, when I come to like, say, healthcare, for that level, for the money that I could have been making, for the money that I would have been making, if I had signed that contract, I could have have any kind of healthcare that I want. But at the same time, I also want the guy on the other side of the table to take some responsibility. I'm like, okay, I'm giving you a healthcare, for example. So you wanted something like healthcare included? Yeah.

I want stuff like that. I want something like a guarantee. Since I'm making this as a living and I'm exclusive to you, you guarantee me that whenever I could fight, you find something for me. You are obligated to give me a fight. Know that because if I don't sign a contract and you want me to sign and you want me to run out of money and crawl back to you because I need those money, then you staff me and not give me a fight. Even though you know that I might need two or three fights to make a living, to keep up my lifestyle, then you strengthen down to one fight, so I will be needing money

and then will be forced to take a contract that I don't want just because I need money. So I want to make sure I'm super clear on this. You essentially wanted a guarantee of fights within the contract so that you could... A guarantee of engagement. I'm giving everything.

I'm giving up all my rights. Exclusivity. Exclusivity and everything. So you can't go and do anything else? But I really... Yes, but you are not committed to anything. So, okay.

So I'm the UFC. I'm not committed to anything, but you have to give up your exclus So, okay. So I'm the UFC. I'm not committed to anything, but you have to give up your exclusivity. Yeah. And I'm not even guaranteeing that I'm going to give you... And then some exclusivity in that contract set in perpetuity. Forever?

Yeah. So exclusive forever in certain situations. But at the same time, you really have no obligation. But I have no responsibility or obligation to give you anything. Yeah. So it's really one-sided. Yeah.

Okay. So if you decide not to give me a fight for two years, I can say anything. And you'd starve. But if you call me and say, oh, you have a fight in, okay, I have a fight. I want you to fight in one month. And I'm saying, oh, I'm hurt. Then you have your right to say, okay, I extend your contract for six months. Oh, okay.

So if you turn down a fight, then they can extend the contract. And it doesn't matter the reason. For any reason. So you could be sick. And nobody will be consulted for that if that's fair or not. They make the decision. So I could know that you are sick and I could offer you a fight knowing that you couldn't take it. And that would extend the contract six months.

Yeah. So you decided to quit and you knew that when you quit, you could lose everything. There was no guarantee that you could go. There's not a bigger fighting league. I decided to leave, not to quit. Okay, you decided to leave.

And when you left, did you have a plan? No, really. How do you feel about the UFC now? I don't know. I think they do business how it's good for them. They do a good business for themselves. I just wanted to do what's good for me too. And you went on to do the impossible once again in your life

because many people thought that maybe you were gone now. You were gone from fighting. But then after that, it was announced that you'd be fighting Tyson Fury in a boxing match who is the world heavyweight champion of boxing. And by many people's account, I watched the fight as well. I stayed up in the UK and watched it. You beat him. You didn't beat him on the scorecard,

but I think in every sense of the word, you beat him. And for that fight, you got paid, I read, many times more for that one fight than you got paid in your entire UFC career.

Yes. From one fight with Tyson Fury. Yeah. entire UFC career? Yes. From one fight with Tyson Fury? Yeah. Um, and even in my view, it would have been a Tyson Fury fight or he would have been a PFF fight, I knew that, uh, from that moment, uh, every fight that I will make, I will be paid more than what I've been making in my entire career. Why?

Because my last years in the UFC, I could have been making more if I have accepted the contract. So I basically left a lot of money on the table in order to get my freedom. I bought my freedom, basically. They say that freedom is not given. It's not given. Freedom is not free. You have to give something in order to get that.

So that's why at that point I made some less of the money because I turned down less of the money because I refused I turned down a lot of money but it worked out it worked in the end because you got paid more in that Fury fight

than you ever got lucky I yeah and then I read that for the fight with Anthony Joshua you earned

about 15 million pounds which is almost 20 million dollars true? I don't know I haven't counted yet so I can I can say if it's true this is I mean it's not true it's not true yeah but you earned a lot of money right yeah life-changing amounts of money what's life-changing I don't know enough money 1000 can't change life depend on where we are standing from you're speaking from my side or

from your side or from whose side you give you give 10 million to somebody it's just another 10 million and he won't change anything in his life and you give 1000 to somebody he changed his life he saved his life he would take that 1000 maybe send his kid at school or maybe buy them some medicine save them from illness or something so life-changing money is not the amount why are you still why are you still fighting then because you don't you don't need why i start fighting you have to find in order to know why i'm still fighting you have to know why i start fighting why why is that i love fighting you're not doing it for the money no when. When I started fighting, there wasn't money.

I fought a lot of fights for free that I had no, not a penny. And what is your goal now with fighting? You've done it. I mean, you've done it. You did the UFC, you've done boxing. As I said, there's always a challenge. There's always like, could this be possible?

Can I done this? Can I, you know, like, what's my limit? How far can I go? I think,

I think whatever we do in life is a shame if we end up not really find our full potential or not giving it all. You know,

I think I can give give all, everything that I have, then I go home. But as long as I still feel like I have something for fighting, I have something to give to the fighting community, I go to the gym, I get excited, I wake up, I think of training and I get excited like, oh, this is it. I still have that motivation, that fire in me.

I think I keep doing it. I go to the gym, I train, I think like, oh, I learned something, I have some improvement, or there's something that I really want to understand how it works or how I want to master. Yes, I think it works like that you have to remember that burger is not just fighting it's a martial art fighting is a martial art and martial art never ends before uh mma came around you will see people

character kung fu taekw, they were doing it for like six until they are 60, 70, 80. They are still doing it because it's a passion. Every single time you eat, you have an opportunity to improve your health. And that's why I love Zoe because Zoe helps me to make the smartest food choices for me and my body. And as you guys will know by now, Zoe is the sponsor of this podcast and I'm an investor in the company. And if you haven't tried Zoe, I highly recommend you do because Zoe combines my health data with Zoe's world-class science. And using those two things, Zoe guides me to better health every single time I make a food choice and eat, which means that I

have more energy, better sleep, better mood, and I'm less hungry. And the most important thing is Zoe actually works. It's backed by their recent clinical trial, something called the Method Study, which is the gold standard of scientific research. I started Zoe just over a year ago now, and I've been able to track my progress week after week so I can learn how to be even smarter the following week. And if you haven't joined Zoe yet, I'm giving you 10% when you join zoe now just use the code ceo10 at checkout when you left cameroon you had a really clear goal you had this vision a really really clear goal what is that to stand on top of the mountain

and you stood on top of the mountain but there's the biggest mountain as i said there's always a biggest mountain there's always a mountain ahead that's the biggest mountain? As I said, there's always a biggest mountain. There's always a mountain ahead that is big. What is the big mountain in front of you now? What's coming. What is that? Another fight. Do you want to become the heavyweight champion

of the world in boxing as well? That's never been my goal. My goal was really, because I was aware of the situation. My last fight, my first fight in boxing was less than a year ago, October, October 20, uh, 23. And I was what? Already 37.

It's not a moment in your life that you're expecting to have a career into a combat sport like boxing. You know, he was just like, OK, what can I do? And I think that question still stands. And even for MMA, I think there's a lot of things for me. I've been doing even MMA for just like, what, 11 years and i think i still have so a lot of things to learn to experiment to to show in the fight i think i still have a lot and i still have that passion i'm uh i'm not very young but i still have a couple years in front of me to be doing it because after this you have to remember that after this maybe by the time i'm 40 42 then i'm retired what an early retirement we only have that short window of a time then at 42

like it's a time that most people a career just pick up but we are forced to retire by that time so why would i just like do what i can do until then and see how far i can go you fought tyson many people think you won the fight an incredible fight um you fought anti joshua you lost that fight um and i think at the end at the end of that fight anthony actually says he says you should you need to carry on boxing you need to carry on going and i think that's end of that fight, Anthony actually says, he says, you need to carry on boxing. You need to carry on going. And I think that's the sentiment that everyone has. No, I'm carrying on.

I don't really take that fight as a no, because not to say, I mean, you cannot, you will be a fool if you're going to fight basically in boxing, somebody like Anthony Joshua and don't think that you can lose, right? Or trying to make an excuse of losing. If there's somebody that you can lose against in a combat sport, then he's somebody like Anthony Joshua, right? But honestly, on that fight, there was a lot of unfairness you know

and then which might have been for something or not but there was a lot of unfairness unlike the Tyson fight that everything was straight and I think nobody was giving me a chance and then

everything was fair. No sneaky stuff. But the second one, he was so messy. What do you mean? A lot of tricks. Like, they will get you everywhere that I was going in that week. I have to wait at least one hour, one hour and a half before the beginning or before Anthony Joshua arrived.

But they always send a car to pick me up, like that amount of time, even the fight day. The fight day, I stay in the locker room for four hours and a half. They send a car to pick me up, pick up time 10.30 four hour and a half, four hours and a half. They sent a car to pick me up, pick up time 10.30 because you're supposed to fight. They tell me up front I'm supposed to fight around

midnight and 1 p.m. So pick up time. 1 a.m. Yes, and 1 a.m., sorry. Pick up time 10.30. It's like okay good it's how it works it's that

amount of time then you get in the arena they're like oh yeah there's a there's a producer like oh

we are we are running behind clock on the broadcasting so we might be fighting

at 1.45 okay it's not that bad I've been training to fight in that time frame on the broadcasting, so we might be fighting at 1.45. Okay, it's not that bad. I've been training to fight in that time frame, in around 1 a.m. Bro, we are sitting there and then watching Anthony Joshua arrive in the arena at 1.30. Like, how come you tell me that, you guys tell me that

I'm going to fight around midnight and 1 o'clock or that he's delayed, I'm going to fight at 1.45 and then he's now just arrived. When he arrived, we know that it's about two hours before there is a fight. You don't get in the arena one hour before the fight. No, it's two hours.

And stuff like that, they did a lot. Again, not to say I couldn't lose the fight, but... Do you think they were doing that intentionally? Yeah. You think that? Yeah. I say the whole week, it was was like that they were wasting your time i mean i think it's a trick i didn't know before but i think he said he's a trick that they have in boxing they have a lot of tricks and uh in fact like in the in the week during the week

my coach dewey because he's a very calm person and he was like at he get to the point that he was uh really mad and was yelling about it like no this is how you get to get you do to get fighter tired and i'm like no it's okay i didn't know how deep was the problem you know until i get in the final set then i'm'm like, okay, this is serious, but he was too late. Were you tired? Very tired. I was sleeping. You were sleeping before?

Yeah. I don't know why. I don't know if it was just the fatigue or whatever. I was in the locker room getting a warmup and falling asleep and feeling asleep. So that's why like, personally, personally, yeah,

I take that loss, but I don't put it in the context. You know, I think it could have been different. Do you think you could have beat him?

I still think I could have beat him. I could have lost too, but not that easy. Yeah, things were so easy. Like, I wasn't, I don't know.

Yeah. Did you feel like yourself? No. Not at all. Not at all. But I think it was my mistake. I shouldn't have done good in the Fury fight. I think that was what was expected in the Fury fight for me to lose.

Maybe in that fashion. You have, um, you come out of the fight with Anthony Joshua and you go back to making plans for the future. And then life shows how cruel and unfair it's capable of being when your 15 month old baby boy, Kobe passes away just a few months ago, I'm really sorry. Thank you.

And, um, it is the, the most unimaginable, the most unimaginable thing. Yeah. the most unimaginable the most unimaginable thing yeah that's something that I never I never imagined and all of the sudden nothing really matters all of the sudden you realize that you were complaining about a lot

instead of being feeling blessed being grateful you were complaining about things that. Instead of feeling blessed, being grateful, you were complaining about things that didn't work. But in fact, everything was working well. How are you? How am I? Yeah. Alive.

I mean, surviving. But not the same. I don't think you will ever be the same. I don't think he'll ever be the same. And I can't explain how in just 15 months, I mean, I still ask myself how in just 15 months a kid or a person can take this much space and basically became you to the point that when he's gone,

you feel like you're missing too. Just 15 months. I mean, two years ago, he wasn't there and I was living good. He came and he left. And I felt like, I don't know this is a weird type of thing basically like after what I was saying earlier like my whole life was about to do to fight in order for my family not to go through those situations,

not to feel powerless or useless in the situation. And for the very only person that I should fight for, I didn't even have a chance. So sometimes only that idea is painful you didn't have a chance yeah he wasn't sick we didn't have to take him to the hospital didn't have anything like that you know i wish i could have like know, take him to the hospital, find for a good doctor, like make calls and do stuff, you know, feel like I'm useful. I'm playing.

I'm useful just as I always want to be. So that was it. Is it possible to, is it possible to is it possible to have you been able to grieve and process it how do they grieve how do they process it

I never learn I never know how it works you just feel it some days you do with it some days you do with it someday you do without it how how do they deal with that kind of situation there's not a um how they say there's not a process that they set up to to learn how to go through. People will do it in different ways.

And how long it takes to grieve? When did it stop? Whenever. how long it takes to grieve when did it stop whenever you know one of the big conversations in I think that's become quite popular is the idea of mental health and protecting our mental health and being aware of our mental health when something like that happens to you

it's the most I mean I've never I don't have children yet so I've not been through something like that happens to you it's the the most i mean i've never i don't have children yet so i don't i've not been through something like that but i can just imagine the the way that i try and imagine it is i have these wonderful nieces and nephews in my life my brother is a year older than me has three children and they're like my children in a way and just the thought of something happening to them is the most it's the most unimaginable crushing feeling to me. And men in particular aren't very good at dealing with things compared to my partner, for example. She's very expressive, very emotional. She expresses how she feels.

What are you like at expressing how you feel? You don't learn how to express. I think I found myself very emotional at some point more than what I thought you don't it's not something that you commend it

you don't control it just happens and then you you discover yourself and you're still in that process yeah you discover your own self you think you've been through a lot yourself. And you're still in that process? Yeah. You discover your own self.

You think you've been through a lot. You think you're strong. You thought you were strong. You realize you were not at all. How is your family? Your family, your mother, everybody else? Surprisingly, I think a lot of people are doing pretty good,

better, which is, for me, a surprise. I always walk around like the toughest guy until now. Until now? Yeah. And I get to,

you know, just being tired just getting tired being tough I think it's exhausting being tough mean you have to be through over and over

to a lot of shit which just not easy to deal with because people see you as a you know they see you as a tough guy just not easy to deal with. Because people see you as a, you know, they see you as a tough guy.

That's your, they called you the predator. They, you know. I don't know. I've been questioning myself about that lately. Yeah. Yeah. That's why I like, you see people trying to know somebody,

pretend to know somebody. Meanwhile, they don't even know themselves. You can know somebody who doesn't even know his own self. You don't know who you are. You don't know what you can do, what can affect you, how you can deal with things that never happened to you. So you can't expect to know that about somebody. What have you been questioning in yourself?

If I can deal with stuff, if I can handle stuff, been doubting about my capability of stuff sometimes. What are you talking about? In terms of dealing with stuff, handling stuff? Emotional things? Yeah. Like,

yeah, even emotionally. You know, there's a lot of, there's some days that you wake up and you don't, you think about everything, about stuff, about everything. And you're really like, what's the purpose, what's the goal, if it's going to end up like this.

What's the purpose of fighting if I will end up not being able to fight for the only person that I can fight for? Let's talk about something else. Yeah, I'm sorry. What else do you get? Move on to something. I am... You're in Vegas at the moment?

Yes, but I'm going home soon. Going back to Cameroon? Mm-hmm. Next week. Next week? Mm-hmm. What's the plan? I'm going to be there for a couple of weeks

I'm training now I want to really make a purpose make a have a purpose you know make a sense of all of this

and I think I'm going back to fight so I've been training a little bit because like I get to the point that I feel like I really need to push myself to get out there. Start to think about something.

Find purpose. And that's what I'm doing now, training. And I think I should fight. I need to fight. I might fight before the end of the year. I think some MMA fight would be good to get back in the loop a little bit before going back to boxing again. You're fighting in a new league under a new promotion,

which is very exciting. I saw the announcement. PFL Africa and they announced it the other day in Nigeria in Lagos, Nigeria with one of our new partners, Elios so it's been good It's about purpose now, it's about finding new purpose you said fighting for a reason

fighting for a reason you know, something to fight for I think it's whether you you make it a purpose to keep going or a reason to keep going or a reason to stop but

other ways either way it can serve as a as a reason and your reason your purpose you're going to get out there and find him? Yeah. I think my son was full of life.

I think if there's one thing that he wasn't, he wasn't inactive. He was very active. He was very curious about stuff. And I think the best way to honour him

would definitely not be to quit or to leave, things like that, because of him. I think if there is a way that he would like things to be done, it was to serve as a motivation or to be a reason for things to happen. That's what you've always been, Francis. That's what you've always been. You've always been an inspiration.

He's now an inspiration, I think. He's now your inspiration? Yeah. I had so much in this kid. He was just 15 years 15 months old but you know i have so many plans was doing this was preparing that was having a bad building a basketball court was getting ready for his um like looking for a soccer cleat of his size so we can go play soccer when he started because he just started to work when he saw it we could play everything

he become he became a goal he wasn't like just a kid he was a goal, it was exciting, waiting. You know, it's there and it's time. Yeah. So, fighting nights. The goal is to fight before the end of the year. So I'm training. I'm keeping in shape. But I have to go back in Africa a little bit. Is it easy to train at the moment?

Or is it day by day? It's day by day. I think, as I said, like there's some day like I don't just really want to do anything. I don't really care. And those are the days that you, I mean, that's how, that's what your heart tells you. Like your heart don't really care about anything. Then your brain will tell you, be reasonable and tell you that to go. That's when you really have to.

At that moment that you feel like you's when you really have to. At that moment that you feel like you don't want to do anything is exactly the moment that you have to do something to get out of there. Because like those emotions they are

pretty good at shutting things around you. Sometimes you get in the just get, I don't know, in the bath and then just get stuck in there and then memories and stuff just get you stuck in there and you're so sad inside that you don't even know that you can push the door and get out. So you have to do something, you have to keep. And then when you push the door, get out so you have to do something you have to keep and then when you push the door get out maybe walk in the room or something then you change your mind and you're like oh this pick something down and then you have changed your mind but if you stay in that

bath uh bathroom those same memory will run over and over and over. Have you spoken to a therapist at all? Or anyone that can help? Do they take a pain away? Or bring it back? I think it's a process that you have to go through. It's a pain that you just have to learn with. It's like having a handicap. You just have to learn with it's like having a handicap uh you just have to learn to deal with there are people today that live pretty good without hand or food or food

which at first or they get impudated and they have to rehab to deal with you've um you've been an inspiration your whole life, your whole life to so many people. You now say that Kobe is your inspiration, and he's the reason why. And your motivation. Yeah. And he's the reason why you are striving.

He's the mountain. He's pushing you up a new mountain in your career, in this chapter of your career. And I'm really, really looking forward to seeing this season of your career play out. Yeah. I hope I'll be able to do it. But I just have to get out there and find out.

Francis, we have a closing tradition on this podcast where the last guest leaves a question for the next guest. So the last guest has left a question for you and they don't know who they're leaving the question for. Okay. And the question is here. When did you last realize that you had it all wrong?

When my boy passed away. That was the moment that I realized that everything, I mean, everything that's been my reason for fighting, fell apart. That was the moment that I feel that I really feel like I feel like a failure. You feel like a failure?

Yeah. I feel power. I just feel like I could have done something. Just that. Francis, I have to say a huge thank you. I have to say a big thank you. And I'm not just saying thank you from me,

but ever since I heard your story that time in Paris, when we were in that hotel, you put my life in perspective. You gave me gratitude that I probably didn't have to the same extent before because you've been through an incredible journey. And throughout that whole journey, you've got this perspective for life where you understand more than I ever did what's important things like family things like principles you've understood that more than I did and you also having gone through that entire journey I didn't hear you feeling pitiful

complaining about the struggles you'd been through. And I reflect on the life that I've lived and the things that I'd dwelled on. And I thought, oh my God, this guy has walked out of a really, really dire situation and built this, the most incredible life. He's climbed to the top of the mountain. And it's funny because when you climb to the top of those mountains, you get there alone. What you don't ever get to see is that you've actually brought millions of people there too, because you've inspired them. And you've shown them, proven that they have no reason why they can't too. If Francis could, if Francis could go from Cameroon on that journey through the Sahara desert, he tried to climb the fence, couldn't get over the fence, then went through the sea on the boat from Spain to Paris,

from Paris to the USA, to the top of the mountain, to beating Tyson Fury. There is absolutely nothing that I can't do. Yeah, I think so. I think there's a lot. We set a lot of limit for ourselves by just like, oh, it's not possible, which, again, we don't know what's possible or not. But staying there, thinking of what's possible or not does help.

Actions help. And sometimes you try, you fail. It's okay. You stand back up, pick your shit, reset, start again. And then once you make it, and then once you really make it, and I'm like, oh, he's a genius. Like, how did he know that this would work? He didn't know anything.

Just keep trying. Just refuse to give up. It's just like that. And it's something that, you know, because at some point, like, I feel like I need to succeed in order to prove everybody that was doubting at me, to prove them wrong. Because even, like, coming from where I came from, having the idea of boxing, bro,

here was the worst thing that, the worst dream that you could have had. Like, everybody, nobody believed in me, in it, in the dream, not in me, but just in the dream. Like, it's not possible. We can't come from where we are to get there.

It's not possible it's not mean for us find something that is around us and get settled you know like they really thought i was losing it basically like when i let um my little job in the village like say go to the city i was 22 years old and i i saw my motorcycle okay, go to the store and buy gloves and stuff that I'm doing boxing. I'm like, okay, this guy has got to the top level of craziness. What the hell is this? And everybody doubted. I mean, even my mom say like you're my son i always stand by your side even when you're

losing it like now i'm like okay at least i know that you know but and one day it happened i made it and i'm like wow he's a genius How do you know that it's going to work? I didn't know. Just keep doing it, you know. So whatever you have, you can keep trying. It might work, might not, but at least you will be in peace with yourself knowing that you have given it all. I think it's the most important.

People are so afraid to fail that they don't even try. And I think that's really, that's the failure from not taking action. The failure is not actually the fact that you don't succeed in whatever you do. The failure is not taking action, it's not even trying. That's why you're really fair. Francis, thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Honestly, it's the most amazing honour. And you're such an incredible person on and off camera. You're such a wonderful human being, but you're just the most tremendous inspiration. I've interviewed three, 400 people, but I've never,

ever encountered a story. You do that a lot. Yeah. As heroic as yours. I'd rather fight than interviewing people. Thank you.