Carlos Alcaraz speaks with CNN after US Open win — in his first public speaking engagement since the attack on the Charlie Hebdo magazine in Paris on January 7:
Carlos, why have you not been speaking since the attack?
I have been a little bit busy but it’s the same reason why I was not speaking in Europe. I was speaking at the World Cup in South Africa, also doing a meeting at the University of Pennsylvania and I went to the UN – we were having a meeting with the UN. I went to the UN and I was there for the final. My assistant, Sergio, took me to the restaurant and we sat down – I had a very long meeting and I was not able to speak to people I hadn’t talked to in so long. And I thought maybe I wouldn’t be able to speak at all.
What has happened in your life over the past year?
I have been travelling a lot. I was in South Africa in December, January, February, in March I went to South America and in March and April we travelled around the world, which was extremely hard work especially since I had a speech I had to give the day before that I had to speak in the UN, in New York. They brought me in like in a kind of a trailer and I was trying to learn French again and I was preparing to speak in French. It was in the middle of April. And then I had the big conference in Paris with the UN and I was speaking there at the UN, and then, after the attack in Paris last weekend, in a couple of days I was going to come to the US Open. I didn’t actually go to the US Open, Carlos, I only saw him for a couple of hours in the warm-up before he played a couple of rounds – but I had to meet my team and we talked and took pictures. So that was interesting, I met my team after the warm up. And then I went to the restaurant where all the players and all the members of the team are — we have the restaurant all to ourselves, it’s an Italian restaurant, and I had a very nice conversation with the team, and then later on I went back to the hotel and that’s when I started worrying. I just started thinking about the things I could do, and I was talking with my wife and my kids and they were saying
