Paul Lim digresses.

Again.

His stories turn the next spontaneous loop, and the enthusiasm grabs him as if he had been there himself.

Back in the early seventies, when a group of English students invented the electronic dart machine in a school project and sold the patent to an American businessman during a tinkerer's show.

In the USA the device went into series production and changed the way of throwing arrows.

Leaving home to conquer the world - it is also the heading of his own life story.

The Singaporean is not only an outstanding darts player, but also a passionate storyteller, whose biography takes place in so many locations it can make you dizzy.

Around the world and back in 80 minutes.

Lim is currently in London, where he will be the oldest player in the Darts World Championship on Friday.

It is his 24th participation, he is 66 years old, and even if he was never among the favorites for the title and the quarter-finals are the best, the “Singapore Slinger” shaped the event like no other.

As a crowd favorite and for a long time the only exotic that could also keep up with all the English, Scots, Welsh and Dutch people in terms of sport.

Clean technology: Paul Lim at the 2018 World Cup in Alexandra Palace

Source: Getty Images / Getty Images Europe

It wasn't Phil Taylor or Eric Bristow, not Jocky Wilson or Raymond van Barneveld, who made the first nine-darter on the big stage.

It was Lim who made the perfect match at the 1990 World Cup.

He made history in England.

Where his own began.

At least that of the dart player Paul Lim.

In London alone with £ 1,000 in his pocket

In 1974, at the age of 20, he came to London with a suitcase and £ 1,000 in his pocket.

“I didn't know anyone, but wanted to get out of Singapore.

I wanted to see the world, ”he recalls.

For eight pounds a week he rented a small bed and breakfast, found a job as a delivery man in a furniture store and, through church visits, soon met a couple who took him in.

“I was very lucky.

They were nice people, both doctors.

I lived in a room in the attic.

Three of the five sons had already moved out.

They treated me like the sixth son.

And as a thank you, I kept the house clean and did repairs. ”It was Helen, his foster mother, who gave him the opportunity to start his dream job.

Lim moved into the restaurant business and got an apprenticeship at the Chelsea Hotel.

He worked his way up from vegetable peeler to chef de partie, won competitions and soon proved his dexterity in another discipline.

There are certainly parallels between cooking and darts.

“You have to be good with your fingers: coordination, concentration.

I was also very successful in table tennis and bowling when I was at school and in the army.

Actually for everything that had to do with the hands. "

On a Friday evening, the hotel manager took him to Robin Hood, a pub in Gunnersbury where a tournament was being played.

“50 pennies stake and the winner got a big bottle of whiskey,” says Lim and laughs. “When I got my first darts in my hand, it was easy for me.

I had no problems.

I have won a lot, but I don't drink alcohol and have given the bottles to my friends.

That's how I started playing darts. "

Lim's passion was awakened.

He bought a board, initially cheap plastic arrows, and later a set for five pounds.

He tinkered and analyzed his throw.

He didn't know how good he was back then.

He only had the games with friends and the Friday pub tournament.

In the following years he changed hotels, in the meantime left London for love for Cardiff and after six years also the island.

Back in Singapore, Lim started working in the kitchen of a five-star hotel but could no longer play.

“Back then there was no internet.

I searched for a place to throw arrows for six months.

But I couldn't find a pub, nothing. ”When an English kitchen assistant heard of his problem, she spoke to her superior.

Her fiancé is the team captain of a team in the Singapore Darts League.

"She invited me to introduce myself to her fiancé," says Lim, who was immediately reported as a substitute, came on board and won his match.

“I played the captain, had no idea who the hell he was.

But everyone was beside themselves after the win and said that I had just beaten number one in Singapore. "

Lim didn't know about the Singapore Open, which was taking place a month later, but people talked him into participating.

He won the tournament, as well as the Malaysia Open four weeks later and the Thailand Open another month later.

While he was cooking nouvelle cuisine under Paul Bocuse at the Marco Polo Hotel, he became a popular darts player in Asia.

He changed hotels and countries and, after two years in Papua New Guinea, also competed for his new home in the Pacific Cup in Australia.

Kitchen icon: Paul Bocuse was Paul Lim's boss in a five-star hotel

Source: pa / United Archive / Wolfgang Kühn

The American players were amazed at his talent and told him about the professional tour in the USA.

“I then went to the hotel manager and complained about my inner conflict: I felt bad about quitting my job, but I love to play darts.

What should I do?"

His boss gave him the opportunity to return and sent him to America.

Lim went to Boston.

“But it was January and I'm a boy from Singapore.

I would have died there and after a few weeks I moved on to Los Angeles. ”There he lived with dart player Andy Green, who often worked as a construction worker on skyscrapers.

“I helped him, but it was hell.

I couldn't do it for long, walking unsecured over rooftops with bags weighing 25 kilograms. "

So Lim switched again, took over the kitchen of a darts bar from Monday to Thursday and played a tournament every weekend, where he competed in singles, doubles and mixed and always collected $ 3,000 to 4,000.

In the very first year he was the leader of the US prize money ranking, for which he also competed at his first World Cup in 1982.

In 1986 he married an English woman whom he had met at a tournament in Spain.

The couple had two sons, but they divorced in 2019.

“On July 4th,” says Lim, raising his forefinger and laughing, “Independence Day.” He hasn't been home in San Bernardino since he followed the e-dart boom to Asia in the 1990s.

Lim lived in Taiwan, in Hong Kong, marketed slot machine darts and eventually became a legend himself as an e-dart player.

Mensur Suljovic has been among the best in the world for years, despite his unusual throwing technique

Source: pa / empics / PA Wire

Until today he only plays on the PDC Tour twice a year.

At the World Cup, the national competition, and the World Cup.

There is no doubt that it would have been possible.

But he has never regretted his career.

“I've had a pretty good life.

I'm not a van Gerwen, not a Phil Taylor.

They are on a higher level, ”he says, but has a not unimportant suffix:“ because they are used to the level.

But if a Mensur Suljovic can play among the best in the world, I would definitely have made it.

I am the van Gerwen of e-darts.

The Phil Taylor in the soft tip. "

In 2019 he competed for Hong Kong at the World Cup in Romania, where he opened a bar downtown a year and a half ago.

There is space for 200 guests in the “Home of Legends”, and twelve e-dart machines are used.

On the walls are pictures of sports icons like Eric Bristow, Muhammad Ali, Pelé, Bruce Lee, Jack Nicklaus - and Paul Lim.

He is the only one of the legends that is still active.

Will it be his last World Cup?

“I'm getting a little tired.

I used to be able to party all night and still play the next day.

It wasn't a problem.

But that doesn't work anymore. ”He also has knee problems.

“It gives me pain at tournaments in Asia.

But the events also last the whole day, "says Lim," the World Cup is not a problem for me. "