64 THRASHER
JAPN
WORDS BY JEFF MOYNIHAN PHOTOS BY FRANKIE
Left: YUICHI OHARA (ollie over the hip).
Age: 23
Skating: 7 years
Home: Tokyo, Japan/Costa Mesa, (now)
Sponsor: Element flow, Vita Shoes, Network 17, Fat Bros.
Japan: It's a small place but there's a bunch of stuff to skate. I have been through Philly,
Costa Mesa, San Francisco, and Tokyo, Japan. I can't really tell which place is the best
but I get a really good vibe and refreshment from Tokyo. There are a lot of good-ass
skaters you've never seen in this city. So if you ever have a chance to come, check this
city out. P.S. Bring a lot of money; be prepared!
WHAT'S DIFFERENT ABOUT SKATING ANYWHERE?
S
WHERE IS TOKYO?
omething like 15% of eighth-graders can't even tell where the US is on a map. But unless
you're one of them, you probably already know Tokyo is the biggest city in Japan, which is that
country on the other side of that big ocean next to California. The place where all the video games,
cool animation, karaoke, and sushi came from, among other things. Given a map, most of you reading this could
probably point out the skinny string of rocks that is Japan.
So imagine a skateboarding map of the world. This map wouldn't be
about physical location, but skateboard location. Dead center
on this skate world map would be Southern
California, with Northern California next door, and
New York, DC, Chicago, Boston, Vancouver,
Philadelphia, and so on clustered all around.
Further out you'd see the Duluths, Shreveports,
Boises, and Trentons of skateboarding; yeah,
people skate there, but there aren't many
spots and after a few years everyone either
moves somewhere better or quits skating
to pursue a career in landscaping.
Finally, at the edges of this map are all
those crappy middle-of-nowhere towns
where the few (if any) people skate-
boarding are probably five or more years
behind the rest of the skate world, either
hating life or without a clue.
Where places are on
the skateboard map
is more about the
fractions of seconds
that pass between
spots in video edits
than the hours that
pass between them
in planes, trains, and
automobiles-Huntington Beach skatepark is
next to SF's Pier 7 is next to the Brooklyn Bridget
Banks is next to Paris La Defense. The waxed Kroger curb
in Covington, Kentucky might as well be in Bangladesh.
So where is Tokyo?
Even though there's plenty of hype in skateboarding about "originality"
and "style," let's face it: for the most part, the actual act of skateboarding is the
same everywhere. There aren't any more new tricks to be invented, and whatever town
you go to across the US or across the world, kids are doing the same maneuvers that you see
your hometown heroes doing, probably on spots that are more or less the same too: the mini-ramp
that ledge down those stairs, that bump that shoots you up really nice, It seems like the only choice
in skateboarding these days is whether you want to be a gnar-bro, tech kid, or somewhere in
between-after you know that, you more or less know what tricks and terram are coming, no matter
where you are in the world.
So what's left? What's different about skating anywhere?
Where is Tokyo? Some possible answers
上競技場案内
Wesad
Luod
Above: Ryutaro Fujii switch heelflips a Tokyo grass gap.
Left: DAISUKE HAYAKAWA (noseblunt slide)
Age: 24
Skating: 11 years
Sponsor: Murasaki Sports, Aesthetics and Elwood (P.I.C.),
Ninja Bearings, Adio (W.O.M.), RGOA
Japan: Everything in Japan is small; in physical and mental
scale-people here too much imitators and not enough
originators. But if Japanese kids try, they can get really
good and make a chance for themselves-they need to go
to America more.