“it’s a great way for both kids and adults to stay in shape. By just standing on the board going down the street... ” Do you remember the first time you started skating and how did it feel? I started skating after watching my big brother Victor skate and by him letting me borrow his board. I used to skate behind our house after ice hockey or football practice in the small town of Tranas (Tranås - Sweden) with my friend Emil who lived down the street. We used to build small jumps and curbs out of old wooden loading trays (lastpallar) and plywood that we got from an industrial area a couple of blocks away. Compared to playing ice hockey or football, skateboarding felt much more free because you could do it whenever you felt like it and you didn’t need to be a lot of people to be able to do it, just your board. So eventually I quit ice hockey and football and just continued skateboarding. It really helped having a great mom that paid for all those skateboard decks and that has always been supportive of everything I’ve done. How does skateboarding in UAE differ from Sweden and the rest of Europe? There’s a big difference. The summers in Sweden are pretty short and the ground is often pretty rough because of the snowy winters, so you get used to skating crowded indoor parks or spots that kids from UAE probably wouldn’t even consider “spots” since the ground and run-ups are so bad. Sweden has very few natural marble ledges and big open plazas with perfect flat surfaces - compared to the UAE were it feels like you can find natural great skate spots with marble almost everywhere. Describe the UAE skateboard scene... Thanks to the royal families there are several easy accessible skate parks you can visit, for instance Tashkeel, Business Bay Skate Park and the indoor Zoo Skate Park in Dubai and the Family Skate Park in Abu Dhabi. You can never get enough skate parks though (haha!) it’s a really fun and cost effective way to get kids away from the computer and TV and couple of hours a day to do some physical activity. 40
fact magazine