The Begining

I started playing basketball exactly in 1993 but i can't remember what date.As days were passing,my passion for basketball kept on growing.I remember i used to play from morning to evening everyday without missing one day.I couldn't stop playing!!They are some friends i started to play with like,Zedong Steve,Gilles Armand,Wilfried,Eddy,Malcom,Djoukam franck & Arnaud.After 3 years my father bought me some Micheal Jordan Videos;that's what really boost my mental and made me started dreaming to play in the NBA(National Basketball Association);i kept on working hard to make my dream come true.Very fast,everybody in the city started to know me because of my passion for basketball and that's how i started to be friend with all the best players of the city.Some of their names are Brice Vounang,Rodrigue Tamo alias Ambiance,Jojo,Foko Raoul,Bertrand Kom,Ngoss,Cheryl,Akoa Richard,Kinkeu Mirabeau,Moussango Christian,Ze Serge,Momo Martial,Tongo Landry and many others.Among these players the one's that made me dream were Brice(his shoot with the board and his leadership skills),Jojo(ball handling) and Kom Bertrand(3 pointers and ball handling).But the one's that kept on giving me advices and were trying to integrate me among the best were Brice,Moussango and Ngoss.My first challenge was to be always selected every time the best players were playing pick up games.Sometimes i was selected and most of those times were when Brice was around so he used to take me in his team.I was scared to play because i was by far the smallest in age and height;so all i used to do was pass the ball and shoot the 3's.At that time no one could shoot the 3's like me!!In 1996,i got my first real competition,the Fenasco in Bafoussam(the best high schools in the province gathered to play a tournament);i was really scared because i had never played such a competition.At the beginning of the first game i was really scared but i was trying to hide.When the game started,after i grabbed some rebounds i became confident and i couldn't feel the pressure anymore;i played well until the finals and i was really surprise by myself.In the finals against Bafoussam,the pressure came back because they had the best team in the province for years.When the game started,i missed the first layup(1 against 0) and the pressure got higher.But after grabbing some rebounds the pressure diminished and i hit some 3's and 2's.But at the end we lose the game but i was proud of myself because my hard work was paying off.The second tournament was the under sixteen years old competition in Bafoussam.I killed it and i was named best under sixteen player of the west province.After this tournament i started playing with the best players of the city more often and was not scared anymore when playing with them.One of the best game was against Nkongsamba in bafoussam in 1998 where i nailed 24 pts and helped my team to win.After this,i gained everyone respect and i was now one of the best players in the city.
During the summer,i went to Yaounde(capital of Cameroon)for holidays with the family as we used to do every year.In order to keep shape,because there was no team and basketball court around my house my father contacted one of his old friend who was coaching a basketball team.He gave me the authorization to come and train with his team while im in Yaounde.I went there a saturday,i was scared to meet players that are better than me because we,in small cities used to think that all the basketball players in the big cities are very good.when i arrived,i saw that most of the players were around my age and i was almost the same height like most of them;this made the pressure i had go down.As soon as practice started,i realized that they were not that good but when we started pickup games,the coach insulted me because i didn't pass the ball to an open teammate;it frustrated me and i couldn't play well the rest of the practice.I started thinking that i'm not good enough.As soon as practice finished,i left and i never came back for the rest of the summer because he made me feel ashamed in front of all his players by what he told me.But when i left,i promise myself that i was going to work harder.That is what i did until my family moved to Yaounde in 1999.