:00:00. > :00:00.team. In this interview he talks candidly about his kidney condition,
:00:00. > :00:34.a troubled youth involving domestic violence and the 1995 Rugby World
:00:35. > :00:41.Cup which made his name. My guest today is Rugby union's first global
:00:42. > :00:45.superstar, 6.5 in feet tall, able to run 100 metres in little more than
:00:46. > :00:49.ten seconds. The game had never seen such an awesome combination of speed
:00:50. > :00:53.and power. Recently, a life-threatening kidney disorder
:00:54. > :00:57.forced onto dialysis. A man once feared for terrorising the best
:00:58. > :01:01.defences in rugby is now waiting for a transplant. On top of that, he has
:01:02. > :01:10.released an autobiography which describes a troubled youth involving
:01:11. > :01:17.gangs and domestic violence. Jonah Lomu, welcome to extra time. The
:01:18. > :01:24.question has to be how are you? You are looking well. I am not too bad.
:01:25. > :01:26.Wish I was playing. This kidney disorder, it is described as
:01:27. > :01:34.nephrotic syndrome, you must have done so much research, what is it?
:01:35. > :01:38.It is a disorder of the kidney, it leaks protein. It does not retain
:01:39. > :01:45.protein and your body does not get it. That is where it starts. Then it
:01:46. > :01:54.will suddenly cause your kidneys to fail. The waste products in your
:01:55. > :02:02.body do not get removed. The effect in terms of your routine are what,
:02:03. > :02:07.exactly? My daily routine now is that I do everything is normal, I
:02:08. > :02:13.can still train, it is just that I cannot run at full speed and so
:02:14. > :02:18.forth. I use dialysis at night, while I am asleep. It doesn't
:02:19. > :02:24.interfere during the day. You look fine at the moment. But, there were
:02:25. > :02:29.times over the last number of years, ten years, there have been times
:02:30. > :02:33.when you have been extremely distressed with this, haven't you?
:02:34. > :02:41.You? Your weight ballooned, you were practically immobile. I had to
:02:42. > :02:46.control a lot of things that could not be controlled, like the weight,
:02:47. > :02:53.retaining fluid and so forth. A lot of people would talk about me being
:02:54. > :02:59.lazy, it was because I just couldn't do it, medically. How did you feel
:03:00. > :03:04.about those criticisms? I didn't worry about it, I knew what was
:03:05. > :03:11.wrong but I did not want to excuse it. Dialysis must be painfully
:03:12. > :03:16.debilitating for anyone, to be tied to a machine, but for you, a
:03:17. > :03:23.world-class athlete, it must be worse? In a lot of ways, it is. It
:03:24. > :03:30.is a medical breakthrough though for kidney patients. If we did not have
:03:31. > :03:37.dialysis, life could be shorter and your life is being prolonged. I am
:03:38. > :03:42.quite thankful in that way. What were the deepest, darkest moments
:03:43. > :03:47.when you were really suffering? For me, in general, it would be at the
:03:48. > :03:56.World Cup in 2003 and watching it from the sideline. From half way up
:03:57. > :04:00.my cards, to the rest of my body, it is the best it can be, it is just
:04:01. > :04:05.that my feet would not do what I needed. On top of the physical
:04:06. > :04:11.effects, there are clearly debilitating mental effects. To me
:04:12. > :04:18.and to a lot of people, the best way to describe it is you think of the
:04:19. > :04:23.hardest thing you can do and the things that you do every day,
:04:24. > :04:26.without any knowledge and you neglect, just getting up in the
:04:27. > :04:34.morning and walking to the fridge to get a drink, I couldn't do that. It
:04:35. > :04:40.wasn't just physical, it was mental as well. It played with you. I was a
:04:41. > :04:45.guy who could run down the field and run into players and who could run
:04:46. > :04:50.down the field and run into players and trying to walk to the fridge and
:04:51. > :04:55.you fall over, that sort of thing, to me that was one of the hardest
:04:56. > :05:01.things. That conjures a desperate picture of you following in your own
:05:02. > :05:06.kitchen. Therefore, there must have been a mental depression, a mood
:05:07. > :05:10.swing element that kicked in here. It was frustrating at first, but I
:05:11. > :05:15.was fortunate that my wife was with me at the time. She has taken me
:05:16. > :05:20.through it. It is quite tough trying to face it and it would be harder, I
:05:21. > :05:27.do not think I could have gotten through it if I did not have her. I
:05:28. > :05:32.have got six stairs and I could not get them on my own. I could not help
:05:33. > :05:39.with groceries, carrying them up the stairs, that is how bad it got. We
:05:40. > :05:45.got second opinions on things about nerve connections in my legs. We a
:05:46. > :05:49.few different things, different treatments and I can walk on my own
:05:50. > :05:55.now and do all the things as as possible. The closest I have got to
:05:56. > :06:01.running is a slight jog. You look well enough now, you are undergoing
:06:02. > :06:06.dialysis still, what are the chances of eventually a successful match, in
:06:07. > :06:12.terms of a transplant? Hopefully, when I get home, I will find out in
:06:13. > :06:17.the next few months whether I have a perfect match in terms of a donor. I
:06:18. > :06:21.was fortunate that I have a great friend who is going through the
:06:22. > :06:25.process and is at the last stage. He faced the possibility that a donor
:06:26. > :06:29.may not be found and the consequences would be what? The
:06:30. > :06:34.consequences would be that you stay on dialysis for a long time. In that
:06:35. > :06:41.sense it is not utterly a life-threatening disease? It is.
:06:42. > :06:45.There are complications you can run into with dialysis. Dialysis clears
:06:46. > :06:52.your blood, but it does not do it as well as the kidney. It gives you
:06:53. > :06:56.about 10%. If you don't get a transplant, your life becomes more
:06:57. > :07:03.concentrated and you become prone to infection. Yes. As I say, you look
:07:04. > :07:08.well. What people do not understand is that you have had the condition
:07:09. > :07:12.for some time. When you burst on the scene in 1995, the big semifinal in
:07:13. > :07:16.Cape Town against them and when you scored four tries, you had been
:07:17. > :07:23.diagnosed with the work you knew something was wrong. I knew then
:07:24. > :07:30.what I had. It is something I kept to myself. Let's talk about that.
:07:31. > :07:35.You burst on the scene, certainly in the UK, it is what you are
:07:36. > :07:39.remembered for most. That feeling, in the semifinal against England
:07:40. > :07:43.when it appeared you were utterly unstoppable, there were England
:07:44. > :07:48.defender is being left in your wake, that must be a fabulous feeling in
:07:49. > :07:52.sport, to be effective the invincible. I do not know about
:07:53. > :07:59.invincible. You were in that much. You were unstoppable. If anything,
:08:00. > :08:06.it was more of a sense of relief for a lot of us as players. The last
:08:07. > :08:12.time New Zealand played England was in 1993 and we lost. I was at school
:08:13. > :08:18.and I sat up to watch it and seeing it on the faces of the guys and I
:08:19. > :08:27.asked them about it and they talked about it, we lost in 1993, we need
:08:28. > :08:32.to correct it. The guys, the feeling I had, was that I was glad the game
:08:33. > :08:39.was done. There was so much pressure and time had been put into it. You
:08:40. > :08:45.were nervous beforehand. So nervous I did not sleep. At all, right
:08:46. > :08:48.through to the game. You are a man already ill, you do not sleep and
:08:49. > :08:57.you have enough energy to trouble the English defence. I stayed awake
:08:58. > :09:00.the whole night, sat up in the morning and looked out the window
:09:01. > :09:06.and watched the England and New Zealand supporters walking and I
:09:07. > :09:12.guess that is when the location hit me and that is where I got my second
:09:13. > :09:16.wind and energy from. The location hit Will Carling, the captain at the
:09:17. > :09:22.time, and he said you were a freak. That is not a kind thing to say, but
:09:23. > :09:26.we know what he meant. I have tremendous respect for him as a
:09:27. > :09:32.player. I do not hold grudges when it comes to things like that. It was
:09:33. > :09:36.meant as a condiment. I think it was. It was just one of those games
:09:37. > :09:43.where everything went my way and everything just completely went our
:09:44. > :09:47.way. Brian Moore said the only way we might start you is with an
:09:48. > :09:52.elephant gun. Slightly insulting, but it is just a measure of the
:09:53. > :09:57.power you had at your disposal. I am just very fortunate to be blessed
:09:58. > :10:01.with a lot of strength and speed. Let's skip on. There have been
:10:02. > :10:07.highlights and low lights in the intervening time since then. You
:10:08. > :10:12.think about 2002 when you were quite poorly and there were people inside
:10:13. > :10:15.the New Zealand camp, the former coach John Mitchell, who were
:10:16. > :10:19.getting impatient with you. He said, frankly I am sick of waiting for
:10:20. > :10:28.Jonah to shoot some form. He must have been aware of how ill you work?
:10:29. > :10:32.I didn't tell him anything about it. Nothing not? They knew I was sick
:10:33. > :10:39.but they did not know the extent. I did not want it to be a reason. I am
:10:40. > :10:46.a person... It would have explained everything. It would have, but I did
:10:47. > :10:52.not want sympathy. Perhaps realism would have been in order? Maybe, but
:10:53. > :11:00.it is how I deal with things. I keep it to myself. Let me take you back
:11:01. > :11:11.to 1975. You went to live with relatives. Why was that? I guess the
:11:12. > :11:17.family wanted me to know where my roots were. I was taking back their
:11:18. > :11:21.and I was very fortunate to be brought up amongst family. You were
:11:22. > :11:28.happy in Tonga but you did not want to go back to Auckland. At the time
:11:29. > :11:32.I was brought up by my mum APPLAUSE Older sister, she did not have any
:11:33. > :11:38.kids. Giving me to her to bring up, I knew
:11:39. > :11:48.her as my mum, I did not know her as my auntie. At the time they decided
:11:49. > :11:54.to operate me and send me back to New Zealand, it was a shell-shocked.
:11:55. > :12:00.You had two brothers in a way, but you did not really have a father. He
:12:01. > :12:05.had a poor relationship with him. The toughest part about that was
:12:06. > :12:11.that me and him had never seen eye. Just run up. I did not want to be
:12:12. > :12:17.any place, so I did everything to any place, so I did everything to
:12:18. > :12:22.rebel. I kept getting trouble. You are talking about your teenage
:12:23. > :12:27.years? Just as a young person. If you're in a place you are not happy
:12:28. > :12:32.with, you do the opposite of what you are expected of. Me trying to
:12:33. > :12:37.say I wanted to go back to Tonga, it would stem into my father trying to
:12:38. > :12:42.discipline me and on. At a young age. It just stemmed from there and
:12:43. > :12:57.it grew from there. You really mean he beat you. Yes. Regularly? Yes. He
:12:58. > :13:03.used a wooden stick. Eventually, you had him back. Eventually, I did.
:13:04. > :13:09.That was brewing from a young age. My father was a very heavy drinker
:13:10. > :13:15.and he was quite violent in a lot of ways towards me, the kids and also
:13:16. > :13:21.to my mother. Look at you now, when you were a young teenager, aged 13,
:13:22. > :13:27.you were well over six foot, you were 15 stone or so. He was still a
:13:28. > :13:34.kinky at that point? Yes, still. He is not that big. Eventually it was
:13:35. > :13:40.no contest. When you hit him back, he stayed hit? I basically picked
:13:41. > :13:47.him up and threw him across the room and whatnot. What was the atmosphere
:13:48. > :13:57.just prior to that so, what precipitated that? I guess my father
:13:58. > :14:00.had come home drunk that night and started ranting and raving at
:14:01. > :14:05.everyone to do things that he wanted and so forth and everyone tried to
:14:06. > :14:11.do it and if it wasn't done enough, you got a slap. By then, my mother
:14:12. > :14:17.had asked a question and he hit and I turned round and picked him up and
:14:18. > :14:22.threw him across the room. You were defending your mother? I was
:14:23. > :14:29.defending everyone. I would rather get beaten than my family. When I
:14:30. > :14:35.had done that he stood up and said you do not belong under my roof and
:14:36. > :14:41.you are no longer my son. I want you to leave, so I left. You must have
:14:42. > :14:44.worried because of the closeness of your relationship with your mother,
:14:45. > :14:49.you must have worried leaving her behind. I did, but I knew she would
:14:50. > :14:59.never leave. That was something I could never face and know why. She
:15:00. > :15:06.is a very loyal person and she gave herself utterly to the relationship
:15:07. > :15:12.and to the kids. If anything, if anyone, changed my life, it was her.
:15:13. > :15:15.If she had not got me out of where I was in terms of going to school, I
:15:16. > :15:22.do not think I would be here talking to you. You can't forget what
:15:23. > :15:29.happened, can you forgive? I can forgive what happened, I just cannot
:15:30. > :15:33.forget it. It is a part of me. I am just very fortunate that my father
:15:34. > :15:38.has changed in a lot of ways with the younger ones. They never saw
:15:39. > :15:44.what happened. Maybe he learned a lesson when you threw him across the
:15:45. > :15:50.room. Maybe. He is a very changed person and he is very forgiving now,
:15:51. > :15:54.he has stopped drinking and he has become a better person.
:15:55. > :16:00.Effectively, you have made your peace with him? No, we have not made
:16:01. > :16:05.our peace, we still disagree on a lot of things. I have always said to
:16:06. > :16:13.everyone that I love my father because he is my father, but that is
:16:14. > :16:19.about where it ends between me and him. The bridge that we have burnt
:16:20. > :16:27.between each other, I think it is long gone. If we sat in a room and
:16:28. > :16:34.talk, there is no worry about that. Has he tried to make an approach to
:16:35. > :16:42.you? No. That is where the make has not happened, we are both proud and
:16:43. > :16:51.stubborn. The one thing that we both have in common in terms of how we
:16:52. > :16:55.could bond is that we both love the same person and that is my mother. I
:16:56. > :17:01.love my mother and he loves his wife. She still loves him, despite
:17:02. > :17:09.what happened? Despite what happened. To me, that is hard to
:17:10. > :17:15.understand, but she cannot help the way she feels. You will know there
:17:16. > :17:18.has been criticism about your decision to go public, but these
:17:19. > :17:25.should be private matters, what is your reaction? I think that is
:17:26. > :17:29.nonsense really. They say you are trying to make money out of it,
:17:30. > :17:32.effectively. When we launched the book in New Zealand, all the
:17:33. > :17:37.proceeds from the launch of the book, none of that came to me, it
:17:38. > :17:44.all went to charity. I do not know where they are getting that from.
:17:45. > :17:49.Also, then sent it should be private, I reckon things like that
:17:50. > :17:55.should be told because if you are willing to tell it, tell it the way
:17:56. > :17:58.it is and tell the whole story. I knew it would be controversial in
:17:59. > :18:02.the Tonga community and so forth, but to me it is irrelevant what they
:18:03. > :18:08.think, it is what I wanted to write and what I believe is true and I
:18:09. > :18:12.stand by it. It is no surprise that given all this difficulty at home,
:18:13. > :18:18.the domestic violence, that you should start running with the gangs
:18:19. > :18:24.in Auckland. You had a pretty unruly youth. What did you get up to? I got
:18:25. > :18:30.into fights and so forth. I guess you are trying to find, I guess when
:18:31. > :18:35.people travel down that road it is trying to feel the need to belong to
:18:36. > :18:42.something. He felt he had been disowned by half of your family.
:18:43. > :18:47.When you are my size and guys want you in the group because of your
:18:48. > :18:51.size it is a different story. With the strong sense of moral outrage
:18:52. > :18:55.you saw when your father attacked your mother, surely it is
:18:56. > :18:58.incompatible with the things you were doing. You were in gangs who
:18:59. > :19:04.were beating up people in the streets, completely unprovoked. It
:19:05. > :19:11.is odd. It was very odd. That was one thing I couldn't understand. You
:19:12. > :19:19.did it nevertheless? I never really did it. I watched a lot of people do
:19:20. > :19:25.it and I never really... The only time I got into fights was when
:19:26. > :19:33.somebody tried to hurt me and I had to protect myself. You were stabbed?
:19:34. > :19:36.It was a case of mistaken identity. They had an argument with someone
:19:37. > :19:43.the night before and they tried to stab me in the leg. In South
:19:44. > :19:48.Auckland, the Polynesians look pretty similar. This can be a
:19:49. > :19:57.vicious downward spiral, but it was the intervention of a schoolmaster
:19:58. > :20:03.which brought you about. I was fortunate to run into a deputy
:20:04. > :20:11.principal who saw me playing basketball, I was 14 years of age,
:20:12. > :20:19.and I was slam dunking. He wanted me to play for the school. He pulled me
:20:20. > :20:25.across and asked what my name was. I said Jonah Lomu search. He said he
:20:26. > :20:34.would like me to trial for the first 15. Had he ever played rugby? No. It
:20:35. > :20:37.all stemmed from there. You wouldn't be sitting here talking about a
:20:38. > :20:44.career in international rugby if that hadn't happened. No. We are
:20:45. > :20:49.drawn to the future. You continue your treatment, do you think you
:20:50. > :20:54.have a chance of putting on the all Black jersey again? I do. You are
:20:55. > :21:01.not just convincing yourself to maintain your morale? No. I do not
:21:02. > :21:09.need that to boost my morale because it is good. If anything, it is more
:21:10. > :21:14.that I know I can do it. I just have got to make sure I get everything to
:21:15. > :21:20.fall into place in the way I wanted and the way I believe it could,
:21:21. > :21:26.there is no reason why not. I have travelled down every single avenue.
:21:27. > :21:28.In 1997I sat down in the DoctorAPPLAUSE
:21:29. > :21:34.Office and I was told I had to do treatment for ten months and I
:21:35. > :21:43.wouldn't play rugby again. To me, it is mind over matter. When
:21:44. > :21:49.did you last play rugby? 2003. It is getting on for a year ago. You say
:21:50. > :21:53.ER keeping fit, but you have to break into the super 12 and then the
:21:54. > :22:02.international side and it is a young man's game. I don't know about a
:22:03. > :22:08.young man's game. Set yourself a target. When will you be back in the
:22:09. > :22:15.team? My long-term goal in terms of having the transplant first and then
:22:16. > :22:18.my long-term goal is 2007. 2007. Three years from now. You will still
:22:19. > :22:23.have the energy and treatment and ungritted played the game? To tell
:22:24. > :22:28.the truth, I would not be thinking about it if I was not that
:22:29. > :22:30.determined. Jonah Lomu, we wish you all the