by Dr. Iain
Corness
Long term returning resident at the Amari Orchid Resort
is Hans-Joerg Leeser, a cigar smoking man who said, “The first one of
the day is always the best.” He is a Swiss national and a man who was a
top sportsman, a very successful businessman and is also a man who broke
his neck in a skiing accident rendering him quadriplegic. His story is an
inspiration.
Hans-Joerg
was a “winner” even from his school days in a small village 40
kilometres outside Zurich. He breezed through his schooling and his
apprenticeship in the clothing business. “Everything was so easy that I
became a really lazy guy.”
On entering the work force, his initial goal was to
make money. He did not wish to wait until he was 65 to be able to retire.
After a slow start, he teamed up with a new business partner and while
sitting in a restaurant in Florence came up with the name for their
clothes label - Leonardo.
That was (and still is) a great success. So much so
that Hans-Joerg became a rich playboy. He had flashy cars, Ferrari’s,
Porsches, BMW’s, and big motorcycles. He was always a natural sportsman,
and became a successful car racer in Europe and a national champion in
Switzerland. In that tearaway lifestyle there was no room for his marriage
which had occurred when he was 23. It was too restrictive for this high
flier and the inevitable divorce happened.
But Hans-Joerg, the man on the move, kept going. He
moved up through progressively larger and faster Ferrari’s. He played
football, tennis, went parachute jumping, played squash and went skiing on
the best slopes of Switzerland.
“I was a good skier and every weekend I would go to
the slopes. April 7th 1985 was a really nice, sunny Sunday. I did a jump
on the downhill section I had done 100 times before, but I lost my balance
and landed on my head. That one second changed my whole life. I realized
immediately I was paralysed.”
Fortunately, some fate was on his side as a doctor
friend found him and arranged evacuation by helicopter. “This was lucky
for me as one hour on a rescue sled would have made it (the injury)
worse.”
He was taken to the paraplegic hospital in Basel and
ended up having an operation to stabilize the two fractured vertebrae in
his neck. Even after this, the surgeon gave him no chance, saying he would
be stuck in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. “It was really a
terrible time, but I never lost my hope that in some way I could have a
good life.” Even the young doctor who was treating him was equally as
negative, saying that Hans-Joerg would never drive a Ferrari again.
Intensive physiotherapy was now his life, but after
three months he felt he could move one toe. The physio agreed but said it
would be next to useless. Four months after the accident he went to his
office for a sales meeting. He was in a wheelchair, but he was working. He
was on the way again. On the way up again. Eighteen months later he was
driving his new automatic 400 Ferrari to see the young doctor at his
rooms!
Whilst all these positive steps were occurring, Hans-Joerg
admitted there were also times of depression when he thought about his
life before, and now in a wheelchair. But positive thinking came again to
his rescue. “I thought to myself, now I am handicapped, what should I
change? I decided - nothing! I would try to be the same as I was
before.”
Such momentous change also made him reflective of the
life around him. He certainly missed some of his sports, but found he
could easily live without them. “There are more handicapped people than
me with my visible handicap. A lot of people are handicapped in their
minds with their thinking. I see people with a small problem, but it’s
easy for me to see that for them they see it as a big problem. So I can
understand them better. Maybe in the beginning I would think about my
accident too, but now, I think it has happened, it has to be like this.
You have to (learn to) enjoy the new situation.”
As part of that new situation he learned to manage
himself in his wheelchair, and then walking with a Zimmer frame and
finally walking with one crutch. No longer was he physically dependant.
He threw himself back into work and the company
continued to prosper. It could now afford him the ability to spend longer
periods of time outside Switzerland. One of those trips was to Thailand in
1994. It was supposed to be Las Vegas, but a friend intervened saying,
“Let’s go to Pattaya. It’s much more fun than Las Vegas.” The
initial trip was 10 days. He now spends the European winters here, making
the Amari Orchid Resort his home for 5 months of the year. “I could buy
a condo or a house, but in the Amari I have the biggest garden in the
whole of Pattaya.”
Hans-Joerg’s definition of success revolves around
happiness. “Enjoy your life, how it is. I am not jealous of
multi-millionaires. Both beggars and millionaires can be the same - good
guys.” For advice to others it was a simple work hard and seriously and
be happy with whatever you have.
Undoubtedly part of the secret of Hans-Joerg’s
success has been his overwhelming positive attitude, a way of looking at
life that he believes began for him in childhood. “I’m a happy guy,”
was his simple way of describing it.
And that happy guy has an infectious way of passing on
some of that happiness to those around him. I must admit I left with a
happy grin too. Thank you, Hans-Joerg Leeser, sometimes we can all
handicap ourselves with our thinking.
