How does a Hong Kong law offer Switzerland a surfing gem?

Hong Kong steps up crackdown on surfers A policy going against the project of Mahohi Nguyen Tang, young hope of the discipline, who therefore logically opted for the Swiss federal framework.

Mahohi Nguyen Tang, 10, was born in Hong Kong to parents of Swiss nationality. From a father from Vietnam, and a Franco-Argentinian mother to be completely precise. The young boy grew up in “La Perle d’Orient”, where he learned to surf at a very young age and where he practices every morning before leaving for school. Gifted, he dreams of becoming professional and participating in the Olympic Games.

However, he will not represent Hong Kong and has abandoned his training archipelago to turn to the Swiss national team. A choice partly motivated by the intensifying repression against surfers in the special administrative region of the People’s Republic of China, and which slows down its progress.

Surfing has been banned for decades near public Hong Kong beaches. Officially, offenders risk a fine and 14 days in prison. However, it remained tolerated, so much so that Big Wave Bay, for example, became a famous spot. But the Hong Kong government is now less conciliatory. Reason given: safety, since some surfers jump into the water when the weather gets wild, in order to chase away big waves. The archipelago, which no longer wants its skateboarders, has recently erected numerous prohibitory signs.

This ban means that surfing is also unstructured in Hong Kong. However, without a federal framework, the progress of Mahohi Nguyen Tang is once again slowed down, and the family understood this by observing the evolution of the young surfer, when he trained on the artificial wave of Alaïa Bay in Sion, when everyone comes to Switzerland every summer. “His level has exploded since he started surfing there. The Swiss national team also trains there and he was spotted by one of the coaches. Even Switzerland is in the process of putting together a national team. For what? Because surfing is now an Olympic sport (editor: since the Tokyo Games),” detailed the father of the young champion to the South China Morning Post.

After a first meeting with the national coach in the summer of 2023, Mahohi Nguyen Tang, motivated by the idea of ​​surfing under the umbrella of Swiss Surfing, was offered a place last August on the U14 junior team. Swiss. He therefore recently took part in his very first official training camp in Sion, in preparation for Eurokids 2024 organized by the European Surfing Federation.

It is still too early to know if Mahohi Nguyen Tang will one day have an Olympic experience on a board in Swiss colors. However, if it confirms its potential in the years to come, such an adventure could be considered more quickly than it seems. This summer at the Paris 2024 Games there was a 14-year-old surfer.

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