FIRST time he disappeared, Fuifui Moimoi was 17.
Innocent.
A young man who, having known nothing but his tiny island of Vava?u, stowed away on a transport ship bound for the Tongan mainland.
It was a trip nobody, save the schoolboy mate who joined him, knew anything about.
And given there is no telephone anywhere in his humble family home, Fa and Finau Moimoi would go weeks, then months before hearing from their runaway son.
?So I disappear, yes,?? the enigmatic Eel laughs, chatting now inside his Fairfield pad. ?But I?d heard so many stories about the mainland, how it was so much more exciting than our island, I had to go.?
Yeah, but for how long?
?Ah, I left at the start of the year,?? he smiles. ?And went back at the end of it.
?It was funny really. My family had no home phone, no mobiles or anything ... Mum didn?t know where I was.?
But does anybody? Ever?
Take the time, playing lower grades with South Sydney, when Moimoi famously walked out on a training session saying ?you play me for 10 minutes, I train for 10 minutes?. Or the Eels press day, back in 2007, when every first grader fronted the cameras, bar one.
When a Parramatta player finds their thongs gone, or shoes filled with water, Moimoi is always conspicuous by his absence. And don?t ask, either, how many pre-season openers he?s skipped with that international phonecall starting ?ahhh, my flight back from Tonga ... it?s delayed?.
And then three days back, Fui disappeared again.
This time, it was a weights session the Eels cult figure cut early. Walking out after coach Brad Arthur revealed Moimoi would be 18th man for the Friday Night Football blockbuster with Manly.
And just like that, one of the most recognised NRL footballers was gone.
?But it wasn?t because I was dropped,?? Moimoi insists of the drama that has since made backpage headlines. ?This game against Manly, it was my chance to thank the fans. I love them, love this club ... and I wanted everyone to see that when I played.?
But you know, maybe this is the way it?s supposed to end.
After 11 years and exactly 201 NRL games ? not to mention those umpteen stories about changing hairstyles, stolen gym fans, even finding $10 in the middle of a game against Canterbury ? this tattooed Tongan enigma simply disappears back into the ether from which he came.
A trail of defenders and memories left sprawled in his wake.
Like when Moimoi first arrived at Parramatta -- ?slow, fat, about 118 kilos I think? -- and was thrown straight into an opening day circuit that had players sprinting, tackling, repeating on a loop that lasted 80 minutes.
But Fui, he collapsed after less than five.
So that weekend, Eels staffers told him only to stay active. Walk, have a swim, whatever.
Yet early Monday morning, Moimoi arrived to proudly announce he?d run seven kilometres. Right around Parramatta Park, he said.
?But Fui,?? came the reply. ?Parramatta Park is only three kilometres. And did you really even do that??
The response: ?Ahh ... no?.
Then there was the summer Eels players remember Fui complaining about how, without air conditioning, he couldn?t sleep in his unit. A statement made right before the giant industrial fan from the gym disappeared.
?And when summer was finished,?? recalls our man on the inside, ?the fan came back?.
Honestly, there are a million of them.
Like Fui telling Eels staffers he could run 100m in 9.7 seconds. But Fui, they replied, the world record is 9.72. ?Ah,?? he shrugged, ?must be over 100 yards?.
Or another time, in a bid to inspire him physically, when an Eels trainer asked Moimoi the Tongan for ?fit, fast, powerful?. And so, he obliged.
The interpreted catchphrase screamed encouragingly in gym sessions, prior to games, even in the heat of battle. Shouted for some six months before Fui muttered how, you know our saying, it actually means eat, sleep and ... well, just think of something else young men like to do with regularity.
But on Friday, it all ends.
While he will likely appear after fulltime to receive a framed jersey from the club, Moimoi says he won?t play out the year in NSW Cup. Instead, he will work on sorting his next contract, most likely in the English Super League.
For a bloke who rarely speaks, it has been an incredible story.
Remembering how, despite being capable of running no more than five minutes on a treadmill in his first week at the Eels, Moimoi was eventually moulded into the type of monster who, in that Grand Final year of 2009, made a whopping 110 tackle busts while also averaging 121 metres.
Here was a New Zealand international with 44cm biceps and 47cm calves. A kamikaze prop who, after being suspended for 22 weeks in his first two years alone, worked so hard at refining both his style, and game, he?s missed only three weeks with suspension since.
Such a wonderful mix of colour and commitment, the bloke runs a support play and finds 10 bucks.
?Canterbury at ANZ,?? he laughs. ?The Bulldogs kicked upfield and I was running back to support. Saw the note on the ground.
?So I stopped, grabbed the money and tucked it in my undies. Forgot about it too. In the showers afterwards, I stripped off and 10 dollars falls out.?
And so, finally, we come full circle to the story that started it all. To Moimoi, then a lower grader with Souths, walking out on coach Paul Langmack after delivering that now most famous of footballing lines.
But as for how much of said yarn has been, err, stretched over the years?
?None,? Moimoi deadpans. ?I was training hard each week but they wouldn?t play me. So this Monday I say to the trainer ?when we?ve trained 10 minutes, tell me because I?m leaving?.
?He did, I said what I said ... and disappear.?
