Lewis was born 40 years ago in Hampshire, England. He has almost no recall of his birth mother who left the family when Lewis was only three-years-old and his elder brother only going on seven. Lewis’ mother-figure was his father’s new wife, Anne, who was wonderful as a step-mother despite Lewis being a self-proclaimed nightmare at school. Lewis’ parents had one more son, together with two others that were Lewis’ half-brothers, so Anne ended up having four boys to raise, a challenging job for any mother. Lewis admits that now, as a grown man, he probably has a better relationship with Anne than he has with his father. Despite not receiving a university education, Lewis’ father became a real role-model to Lewis, who admits the pair share many characteristics, including the fact that they are easily bored. Lewis recalls as a child finding his father very intelligent and entrepreneurial, although this was before he even knew that word. After leaving school, his father had started his career in an entry-level position with an insurance firm and worked his way up to being an accounts director, before leaving the corporate world to seek new opportunities, owning both a grocery and stationery store as well as undertaking freelance accountancy jobs. Lewis saw his father model business success as well as sharing with Lewis his own love of fishing, from the age of just six. Sitting still at school might have been hard for Lewis, but on the lake with a rod in his hand was completely different.

At school, Lewis gave many of his teachers a hard time, though not all. He respected that some teachers were able to empathise with his struggles rather than focus on the disruption he caused, and were prepared to develop an interpersonal relationship with him. Lewis enjoyed his learning in Business Studies, for example, and rarely caused any problem in those lessons. While classroom learning was a challenge, Lewis shone on the sports field, the fastest runner in the school and keen to do anything outside of formal lessons. He achieved As and Bs for his GCSEs after completing the final year of his studies for them via home-schooling as his ADHD became too difficult to manage for both Lewis and his school. Lewis was still clueless at this point about what he wanted to do with his life, so he started his A-levels but in just a month he realised that self-directed study was beyond him, so he withdrew. His father insisted he find a job, so Lewis applied to Lloyd’s bank with an optimism that turned out to be unwarranted. Spurred on by his insistent father, a month later Lewis was working in a local fresh produce company which supplied many supermarkets, in sales administration, gaining his first real taste of work and a good, thorough grounding in business. However, when a job opening in a fishing magazine presented itself, Lewis jumped at the chance, working solidly for nearly four years, until he was an editor. When Lewis is able to work in a field where he has a personal interest and connection, he is focused and a high-achiever. However, take this fish out of the water, and he flounders, a feeling with which Lewis is not at all comfortable.

Sport of many different varieties has been Lewis’ way of releasing tension and anxiety across most of his life. He has played football, snooker and more recently padel here in Hua Hin, yet it is fishing Lewis sees as his saviour, crediting his involvement in fishing as a young man with keeping him out of prison- or so he says, tongue in cheek. Lewis is skilled at coarse fishing, a lucrative sporting pastime in Great Britain and Ireland, where 5-hour-long competitions can have a winner’s purse of up to £100,000. Lewis competed as a member of the English team, uniform ablaze with white lions, his highest competition win being £30,000, a staggering amount of money for a young man. Coarse fishing involves trying to catch the largest weight of fish over the set time, competitors sitting in close proximity to each other on a river or lake, catching fish that are seen as not good for eating, such as chub, barbel, roach, dace or bream. Unlike “game fishing” for trout or salmon which uses fly-fishing and is better known, coarse fishing uses bait and different angling techniques. For Lewis, fishing became a meditative practice and with money to be won, focus was not an issue.

Once working in fishing journalism lost its novelty, Lewis needed a new challenge which he found opening his own fishing tackle shop in Norwich. Being his own boss was a pivotal move for Lewis. His coarse fishing prowess had given him minor celebrity status, and fisherfolk flocked to the store as much to meet him as purchase supplies and equipment. By the time he was 26, Lewis’ store had a turnover of £10,000 a week. This inspired Lewis to open a second store, a financial disaster as he was not able to clone himself and so be in two locations simultaneously.

Lewis’ next big venture, Kahootz Media, still exists today and remains a significant source of income.  Achieving stability in his life has been one of Lewis’ biggest challenges, both in his business and private lives, due to the impulsivity which is symptomatic for many with ADHD. Lewis married at the age of 25, with the relationship lasting under a year, damaged by Lewis’ frequent trips away fishing and his inattention to his wife’s needs. Lewis remarried relatively quickly.  Although his second marriage was also doomed to failure, it was not without success as it resulted in the birth of Lewis’ daughter Matilda, now six years of age. Lewis and his ex-wife had an amicable but costly end to their marriage, Matilda now residing with her mother back in England. The English summer of 2025 saw Matilda spending five weeks in Hua Hin with her dad.  Although Lewis loves Matilda, he fears he would not be able to provide her the stable routine that a full-time parent should. 

Living in Hua Hin has been good for Lewis, who sees his greatest achievement to date as living a relatively normal life despite living with ADHD. He has chosen to remain unmedicated, but it takes a concerted and determined effort to manage his limited impulse control, which can impact life aspects such as alcohol consumption and financial decision making. For no other reason than to prove he could, Lewis abstained from all alcohol for a three-year period, taking the opportunity to eat cleanly and go to the gym five days a week. Although Lewis is now drinking again, he still prioritises his health. A recent motorcycle injury has turned Lewis into an advocate for wearing helmets, as he realised his saved his life, although he is annoyed at the impact the accident has had on his mobility, curtailing his regular sporting commitments.

In November 2024, Lewis’ newest venture, Kahouze, a real estate agency, opened on Soi 102, with Lewis bringing his vast knowledge of marketing and media into a different business environment. Lewis is again enjoying working with several business partners in a collaborative effort, allowing him greater freedom and flexibility when compared to being a sole operator. Lewis is gaining a reputation for his own distinct brand of directness and honesty when providing advice to the potential purchasers of property in Thailand. While some of the other operators in the market might not be pleased with Lewis’ forthrightness, he is not worried about annoying the competition, sure that providing the unadulterated facts will only boost the reputation of his business. Lewis’ resilience and tenacity are likely to ensure his business will prevail, while criticism is like water off a duck’s back.

In most aspects of his life, Lewis is fearless, though he admits to both acrophobia, a fear of heights and its companion, aerophobia, a fear of flying. A recent football competition in Vietnam saw Lewis spending 26 hours on a bus to make the journey when for team-mates a single one-hour flight from Bangkok sufficed. Lewis is working to overcome anxieties which limit his enjoyment of life, since both sport and competition are central to his life.  Lewis calls himself the “world’s most competitive man” and if a perfect score can be achieved, such as in tenpin bowling, then nothing else is acceptable.

Lewis is a very sociable man, both witty and likeable. He has a tight circle of friends with whom he keeps in regular touch and posts interesting observations on Facebook, his “Lewis learns” snippets, where he pokes fun at aspects his day-to-day life, without actually oversharing his personal information. Being social is an essential aspect of doing business locally, and friends call him a machine for his high tolerance of late nights and his willingness to accept any challenge. While Lewis chooses not to dwell on past difficulties, he is developing a long-term plan to ensure his future happiness. He has already visited more than 35 countries, seen his favourite sporting teams play live across the world and attended concerts given by his favourite musical artists including Cold Play, One Republic and Ed Sheeran. Lewis has deliberately left some items for a bucket list; aware he is far too young not to have any future goals. One day in the future will see him drive Route 66 across America in a Mustang, with a sneaky side trip to Las Vegas to try his luck on the tables, when money is no longer any object. One of his greatest life-learnings has been not to sweat the small stuff, as it allows for better decision-making. Lewis aims to live like a dog; being loyal and caring while enjoying the simple things in life, like a walk on the beach, a full-English breakfast and his favourite Sunday roast.

Lewis is never alone at home.  He shares his house with Alfie and Lily, the pair of rescue dogs he adopted in August 2024. Despite the fact that they are terrors with the furniture, Lewis is glad to have their non-judgemental presence in his life. It must also be a relief to not feel the need to compete around the pair. Lewis too is a lover of an indulgent soak in the bath, and even a spa day when he can find the time. Although he has had a remarkable four decades of life so far, there is also a delightfully simple and ordinary side to Lewis, who models honesty, good manners and respect for others while making a comfortable life for himself in Thailand that his teenage self would never have expected. Lewis is the epitome of a winner.