Wy don’t we cover ______? (Okinawa)
August 28th, 2008 by Kilwag
Wy don’t we cover (fill in your favorite geographic locale) because we aren’t there. But if you are, we’d love to hear from you, as in the case with Davie Freeman who is in Okinawa, Japan. Mr Freeman sent some pics and a short write up. Enjoy.
From Davie Freeman:
Most of these are just of me and my friends. I am in the USAF and I’m stationed at Kadena Air Base on Okinawa, the southernmost and most tropical Japanese island. Most my friends are in the Air Force as well, but we have a friends in the Army, Marines, Navy, civilian contractors, and local Okinawans. The Okinawans are a very friendly people. Very laid back. All of us have had to learn a little Japanese to communicate with them. A couple of my friends are quite fluent, I only know basics, but I speak good skatepark Japanese. “Sugoi” means cool, “obunai” means dangerous (literally - it’s risky), and “sumimasen” means excuse me. “Gomenasai” means sorry. I learned that one during my second month on island when my skateboard launched 15 feet in the air off of a wet min ramp and came down on an old Japanese guy’s leg. I looked at the kid next to me on the ramp with the best “please help me explain this look” I could make.
Mike Bourell at the skatepark in Tomigusku.
There are 14 skateparks on this island, most of them are in fact cookies but some of the cookies are pretty well set up. There are two good concrete skateparks here, but no vert ramp or good pools. The closest thing we have to vert is a 6 1/2 foot tall ramp near the air base I am stationed at. It is made out of orange plastic and it flexes when you skate it. The coping is either slick or sticky as hell and hanging up on fakie rocks is something you really have to work to avoid. Easily the sketchiest riding ramp I have ever skated but after dozens of solo morning sessions I love the damn thing. We call it Banana Ramp because for the longest time I thought it was yellow as I am color blinded.
Davie Freeman at Haebaru Skatepark near Naha, Okinawa.
Davie Freeman at Haebaru Skatepark near Naha, Okinawa.
Mike Bourell in Tomigusku
Jason Douglas at Camp Courtney Skatepark.
The last one is my favorite. I took it at Haebaru Skatepark. He was just some random local kid who spoke a little English. When I saw that I laughed my ass off and asked if I could take a photo of his skateboard he got confused. I could tell that he had no clue why it was funny and simply thought that was how you spelled police. Made my day.
Local at Haebaru Skatepark
If you go on youtube and type in Okinawa Skateboarding you can find a couple of good videos. Start with Volcom Okinawa Demo and click around from there.
Locals at Ginowan and Shinto Shin (aka Shitty Shin) feat. Akinori Janaha
Akinori and friends at Haebaru Skatepark, which was featured on the cover of TWS a little while back, sometime last fall I believe. Jake Duncombe backside flipped a “gap” there.
Gushikawa Skatepark. Sai Tetuhara(probably misspelled) is the first and last skater in the video. He rips.
Anyways, give me two weeks and I’ll get you a bunch more photos of the local skaters and skateparks. It’ll give me a good excuse to visit some of the parks I don’t normally skate.
Ok Davie. Sounds like a good idea.
August 28th, 2008 at 3:27 pm
Thanks for the coverage Davie. Its fun to hear skate stories from over seas.
August 28th, 2008 at 5:02 pm
Disclaimer: No affilitation with the videos I posted. It is a small island and I know many of those skaters but was not involved in filming or producion whatsoever.
August 29th, 2008 at 6:35 am
ha ha “fuck the porice”. do they have skateboards at Toys L Us?
August 29th, 2008 at 10:11 pm
In America it is Toy’s L Us but they have a hard time with L’s in Japan so they call it Toy’s R Us here instead. And I’m sure that they do sell cheap Scooby-Do completes there.
August 30th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
please stop by hardcorvallis
August 31st, 2008 at 11:20 am
Skaate and annoy’s fuckijng baackgroundd looks fuucking French…
August 31st, 2008 at 12:48 pm
Yeah, time for a redesign
August 31st, 2008 at 4:43 pm
I’m going to swap out the blue and white so it will look Russian instead.
Actually, I’ve been thinking about looking into tweaking it so you can pick style sheets on the fly and coming up with a couple of different themes. The first option being one that looks like this.
August 31st, 2008 at 9:46 pm
pick style sheets on the fly Interesting, so then would the site have several looks that would change without warning?
August 31st, 2008 at 10:04 pm
It would load with the default, until you picked a different one. A browser cookie would keep track of whether or not you had one picked, load the default if you didn’t.
September 1st, 2008 at 2:06 am
Sorry about the foul language; I don’t remember typing that one. I was very drunk.
September 2nd, 2008 at 3:57 pm
The end of the world is coming! Skateandannoy is posting photos of Spohn Ranch ramp parks without ridicule!
Ko-nee-chee-wa
September 2nd, 2008 at 4:03 pm
Uh oh…
September 15th, 2008 at 4:08 pm
yeah please post more videos and photos of the skatepark in haebaru under the bridge, and please post some local skae spots in naha and havebaru if you can , greatly appreciated
September 15th, 2008 at 5:27 pm
chris? is that teacher chris?
September 16th, 2008 at 5:37 am
I am currently working on getting some more pics and videos. Search around on youtube, or check out the “newest, best street skating video” posted last week. There is some Haebaru skating in there, right around 1:40, I believe.
September 21st, 2008 at 7:49 pm
Does anyone anyone know what the song was in http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8oHJyZvEI0 I am not very well musically travelled so it’s beyond me.
November 17th, 2008 at 7:08 pm
Just a status update for all of my concerned followers: I am currently on leave in Michigan. It is nice to skate some of the local skateparks and spots of my childhood. However, the weather has turned nasty and we are experiencing snow showers with accumulation for the past few days. I have been reduced to paying a $5 fee to skate a 4 foot tall Skate-Wave mini-ramp at Lansing’s YMCA, which I gladly will do for a chance to skate shielded from the arctic chill. The Okinawan perma-summer has made me weak to the extreme winter cold. I will have epic photos soon.