By the time Rohan was about sixteen years old, He was known, in the St. Vincent and the Grenadines Lawn tennis world as: rude, disrespectful and ungrateful. But was he? Or was there a blatant effort to black list this child?
Rohan Adams was also popularly known as Ku-man. The name Ku-man was a name that was given to Rohan, as a child to shame him. But Rohan like the champion he was, never made the name became a problem, instead he wore the name with pride.
Rohan was the Son of Ishmael and Millicent Adams of Cemetery Hill, in Kingstown St. Vincent and the Grenadines. He was one of five children. Unfortunately; for Rohan and the Adams Family, Ishmael Adams, the patriarch of the Adam's family became separated from his wife, when Rohan was still just a little tot.
Rohan Mother Mrs. Millicent Adams, was a: “stay at home mom” who subsidized her husband's salary as a dress maker or a Seamstress, to ensure their little family stayed afloat, especially during the rough times.
With the absence of Mr. Ishmael Adams, Mrs. Millicent Adams was left to carry the burden, of running the household and taking care of her children; all by herself. Ms. Adams always made sure her children had the basics. Shoes on their feet, clothes on their back; a roof over their head and food on the table. One good thing was, the House the Adams family called home was owned by them.
Like the other children who live in the Cemetery Hill and New Montrose area, The Old Montrose Tennis Center was where the boys hanged out and on the other side of the wall; was home to the Nutricia: Netball facility; here was where the girls hanged out.
Being around Tennis for all his life, Rohan developed a passion for the game of tennis at quite an early age. But Tennis was outside of Rohan's financial scope. Everything that was needed to play tennis was extremely expensive.
Back in the seventies, the eighties and the nineties (!970s, 1908s and 1990s) Tennis was known as the sport of the big shot. It was the Children of and the Mr. this and the Mr. That that played the sport; because they could afford, the equipment needed to play tennis.
However, because there was a tennis court within the area and their children spent a lot of quality time at the tennis court. Some parents often sacrifice and purchase for their children, as a Christmas gift, a tennis racquet and balls.
The child was responsible for taking care of the gift. It was critical they did also; because grips for the racquet were expensive, strings were expensive, to replace the strings were expensive, even to adjust the tension on your racquet string was expensive. A warp racquet could still be used, but it was worthless.
The tennis attire was never a problem; especially, for poor children, we all had short pants, we had T-shirts and we all had what was called a gym-booths and or soft-mash. The Gym-boots and or the Soft-mashes, were not tennis shoes; however, they were considered appropriate, for every form of physical activities.
A common occurrence at the Old Montrose Tennis Center was: someone often shouts-out, where is my racquet? Then the person will angrily ask Rohan: "Rohan whose racquet do you have there?" These declarations, brought little Ronah's game to an abrupt end. Rohan was a brave and fearless child, he always boldly walked up to the owners of the racquets, he was using without their permission and handed over the racquet to the owner.
Rohan was not a thief and he did not lie, not even to please those he was around. Ronah, had blunt honesty and truthfulness about him that often offend a lot of people.
The truth be told, no one wanted Rohan around the tennis courts, and no matter how much insults that were hauled at him, he never went away and he never stayed away. Rohan loved the game of tennis, and he wanted to play the game. Rohan was willing to do anything to play the game.
Rohan often became the ball boy, for people who were playing at the court. He often ran outside of the court, climb through a little hole in the Cemetery wall, a hole I am convinced, was made in the cemetery wall by Rohan, so he can easily get into the cemetery; to recover mishit balls for their owners.
All this was done by Rohan, in hopes, at the end of their tennis session, when he makes the request, one of the players, would have recognized, his effort on their behalf and allow him to use their racquets for a little while. Such was Rohan's commitment to learning and playing the game of tennis.
As it relates to the hole in the cemetery wall. I will be lying on Rohan, if I said, I saw, little Rohan, with a hammer and wall chisel, chipping away as he made a hole in the cemetery wall. However, a little hole mysteriously appeared in the cemetery wall; just above the foundation in the cemetery wall. The hole was just big enough for Rohan little body, to easily get into the cemetery to recover the mishit tennis balls.
And as Rohan's body grew bigger, the hole got bigger; however just big enough to allow Rohan's body to get in and out of the cemetery with very little ease.
Then all of a sudden; the hole in the cemetery wall stopped getting bigger. The hole in the cemetery wall; only stopped getting bigger, when Rohan grew big enough and was able to climb over the cemetery wall like everyone else. I am not saying Rohan made the hole in the cemetery wall, but it is hard for me not to believe he did not.
Then someone gave Rohan a used tennis Racquet, this became Rohan's prized possession. Now Rohan no longer come to the tennis court to bum a knock, he came with his own racquet and balls.
You may be asking how, did Rohan suddenly, able to afford balls? Well, if you are wondering Rohan's economic situation did not changed. But because Rohan now had a racquet, he no longer had to go into the cemetery to recover mishit balls for their owners.
Those mishit balls that were not recovered and those mishit balls the owners did not feel the need to go in search of and for. At the end of the day, Rohan went into the cemetery, located those balls and they became; the property of Rohan by default.
Rohan was often heckled by the other tennis players, they often jokingly said: "Rohan slept on the Lawn Tennis Court. This was so for the simple fact, the first person to get to and on the Tennis court in the morning was Rohan and the last person to leave the court in the evening or in the night was Rohan.
Mr. Ali Lynch who was responsible, for all things tennis at the New Montrose Tennis Center; lived about forty feet from the tennis court. The lynch's residence over looked the tennis court.
Rohan on the other hand, lived about what appeared to be, about two city blocks, from the court. Yet Ali could not get to the court before Rohan, no matter how hard he tried.
When Rohan was about twelve years old, the "Ugly Duckling" of the tennis world, emerged into the swan on the tennis court. all of the early morning and late evening at the court eventually paid off.
Rohan was always able to sneak his way into other people's tennis sessions. Because Rohan was always first at the tennis court. When people who made arrangement to meet at the court for an early morning knock, Rohan was always able to entice, the first of the pair, who arrange to meet, to knock up with him, so they will be warm up when their partner arrive.
If the partner no showed, then Rohan becomes their partner by default, for the morning session. When the later partner arrives, the early partner is all warmed up and slamming balls. but the late partner has to get warmed up.
As a result, the person joins Rohan on his side of the court as in a double and they all work together until the late partner is all warmed up. By the time they are ready to play; Rohan would have already gotten in, a morning session of tennis.
It came to a point where, many tennis players, who felt like an early morning or a late evening knock up and did not make any arrangement for the same. Just showed up to the court, knowing the kid will be there: ready, willing and able to give them a good run.
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