167On Smoko
Once we started to skate I instantly fell in love with it again. It’s hard
not to when you’re in an amazing city and surrounded by the booming
kinetic energy and talent of Manchild, Griffin, Niels and Simon. Top
that off with the power and grace of Brophy and the ever-youthful
energy of Rickk and Mike and it’s a perfect storm of skate stoke! I
found the younger dudes’ vibes to be really infectious. They hyped
me up to skate and pushed me to go harder. I sometimes feel bad for
the filmers and photographers that have to keep up with these kids
impulsive energy, but Neihana Tonkin and Bryce Golder were right
there with them and caught some epic impromptu action. The theme
song for our trip was “Smoko” by The Chats. Their drummer Matt
Boggis skates and is on Girl flow. The song is about being on a smoke
break and not wanting to do any work: “I’m on smoko so leave me
alone.” I could relate, although I don’t smoke and actually hate cigs
more than anything. But technically I had been on smoko at the beach
and didn’t want to go to “work” in the city. Turns out it was so chill
and fun we were actually on smoko from our North American lives.Manch, aka The Wall Slob