It is very encouraging that there are around six girls that turn up regularly to the dish sessions to skate. The first female skaters do things a little differently than the boys preferring to pivot off the nose instead of the tail and skating in high heels rather than sandals. While all the boys are waiting patiently or impatiently for a turn on the remaining 8 boards, the girls happily share their skateboard between themselves and unsurprisingly they don’t let any boys near their prized skateboard. Contrary to other media reporting girl power is alive and well in Kabul.
Both Oliver and Travis bought new boards over in their luggage to boost the total amount of skateboards in Afghanistan to 14 boards! The boys were very excited to get the boards donated by Steve Lightfoot as their current boards were decaying under the harsh Afghan conditions. The boys went straight to work cleaning and jazzing up their boards with new graphics. Check it out here.
It was a happy day for us when we found the car parking and we thought that it’s a good place for us that we can practice till we get our own skate park. For weeks Travis and us skated there and we learnt a lot in this place with smooth clean concrete. Then Sharna came back from Australia and she was so excited to see the car park we went there with her to see that place. She likes it because it was a good flat place and of course it was secure place for us. We were happy thing for us was that we were not alone to skate there we were teaching the security guards the shopkeepers and everybody who was coming there and we had communication with each other and we have guys that want to learn.
But the happy days became sad days. On the night of the pool party we met a German guy who was also very interested to skate with us. So I called the security guards that we are coming to skate and he told me that its not possible to skate there anymore….. I didn’t under stand what had happened, so I called Hamid and told him to go and check it out. Munir and Hamid went there and the security guard told them they reject us because the Boss (Police commander) said that this people cannot come here anymore because it’s not safe. They asked him if we did something wrong or did they want us to give them bakhshish (bribe) to enter the car park. The guard told us that nothing is wrong and bakhshish would not work.
We also talked to the owner of that car parking and he also rejected us, but that it was not his decision. He said that Police is not allowing me to give you permission, he wished he could let us skate but it was out of his power.
Since we started skating we have found good friends who really want to help us to build skate park in Afghanistan so that we can continue this sport. But just because of some people that may be jealous we are always stopped from having fun. We are not loosing hope and our mission to have our own, safe place to skate in Afghanistan.
If security was the real issue with the carpark, then we can tell that Afghanistan is not a place where you can have fun and it’s not a place where you can spend your holidays. Every step is a danger, but we don’t let this control our lives and stop us from enjoying this excellent sport.
Best regards
Nabil and Hameed
There will be a fundraiser in the Goethebunker in Essen Ruettenscheid, Germany on Saturday the 23rd of August. There will be live acts, including bands, DJ’s and even a miniramp to skate on the night. The event organisers Sonja Eller and Mitran Kaul are looking for volunteers on the night so if you are in a live act/band that would like to be part of the Skateistan crew, drop us a line. We are also looking for German companies to sponsor the event. If you want to be involved in sponsoring Afghan skateboarding please contact Alexandra Bald @ alex@neongrau.net
Thursday night in Kabul is like Saturday night in other countries. To celebrate we threw an party in our compound and invited the locals. After carving up a couple of sheep into kebab, we invited the local band and got the place pumping - Afghan style. The boys showed their skating skills in our empty swimming pool, much to the delight of the locals. Nabil even got funky with his skateboard on the dance floor. Check it out here
Nabil Tanha:
Two weeks ago me and Mirwais were coming back from skating it was around 9:00 and we stopped a taxi and asked him to drop us to Klola Poshta the taxi driver who was around 40 to 45 years old, told us 40 afs (80 US cents). This was little bit surprise for us as we usually we pay 60 afs from there or if you bargain them down it will be 50…. so we sit in taxi and taxi driver start conversation with us and he tells us that he is very happy to see us with skateboards in our hand and he wants that all young Afghans start this sport. He really likes to watch this sport on Dish Satellite on the Extreme channel. He told us that he is watching Skateboarding for hours and he really enjoys it … When we arrived back at my office, he asked me if I can show him a trick. As you know there is not a good place for skating in our streets, so i take him to my yard where I have set up some carpet to practice my tricks on and i just show him how to do Casper …
The taxi driver is very impressed by our tricks and we talk more about in Afghanistan and how there are 3 sports that usually afghan youths do … Body building , Karate ,Taekwondo, Kung fu (I mean martial arts) cricket and Football .. this is ok, but there is nothing else. We like to do something extreme and more fun and skateboarding is perfect for us……..
Sharna made it to Kabul this week and is under taking the well needed funding drive to raise funds for shipping the donated gear to Kabul and buying land to build the school on. She has been real busy, has already got some results and in her spare time she went for a skate with the crew. Check out the images here.
The new Skateistan designs are available at Wax Musuem Records, Shop 2 Campbell arcade, Flinders street station, Degraves st, Melbourne. There are 3 different designs and 4 different sizes. We really need your support at the moment while we are getting things off the ground so if you are in Melbourne pop in and see Tim at Wax Musuem Records grab a t-shirt or 3 and check out the wicked selection of records. Anyone with one of the 50 original design Skateistan shirts have now got official collectors items!
So we have a new location to skate. The fountain is relatively smooth, its got all the characteristics of a ‘bowl’ and appears to be in a safe environment. We dont know how longer we can skate there, but until the skate park is built, its the best we got. Loads of kids came down to check it out and some even had a go. We know once we have completed construction of our park, we will be inundated with eager youth wanting to learn. Go to the Image Page for full coverage!
Australian skate photographer, Steve Lightfoot did a trip down the Silk road a few years ago and got kids in Tashkent interested in skateboarding. He then started collecting boards from friends to send to Uzbekistan. Due to an unreliable postage system and prohibitative shipping costs he has donated the near new skate equipment to us at Skateistan for the kids in Kabul. The donation includes 15 decks, 7 sets of wheels and bearings, griptape, 2 sets of mounting hardware and a pair of new skate shoes. Thank you very much Steve. If anyone has skateboarding equipment, in decent condition, that they want to donate to Skateistan please contact Oliver by email (skateistan@gmail.com) or phone +61 (0) 400 019 494.
