Saturday, March 25, 2006

The Killer Bees

This is the first in a series of articles I'm doing on 'the Locals' at Mancy Way skatepark and who better to lead us in to this exciting adventure of modern Mancunian skaters but Alistair Mezbourian, AKA Bees. Renowned for his distinctive style, Bees has a clear passion for skating, an unquenchable thirst for the unusual and, I think, a perspective on skating that makes him one of the most inspiring skaters I've seen.















Bees, I believe, was the first person to wall ride the fence above the large quarter. Some think that his ability to ride fences derives from a mystical force that only he possess.... others don't. But, whatever your view, you must admit that it looks pretty cool.















Bees has been coming to the Mancy Way park since we first opened in August 2004. He's part of a community of skaters who bring an atmoshere of fun and excitement wherever they go. Thanks for making my job a lot more enjoyable.

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Cheers Bees and thanks for letting me use these photos.

Friday, March 03, 2006

Skating a Snow Storm

Today it snowed. The snow made me happy. I feel like I've got something to show for the freezing temperatures I sit through each week. Snow's clean and it reminds me of being young and running around making snowballs.

The picture below shows the black steel cabin that I sit in throughout the day, at least when I'm not skating. I need to get power to that little hut. I can then do all sorts of things like use a computer, listen to music, use a light, but most importantly I can turn on our heater!

We had a film crew at the park today, too. They are making a film about life in Manchester called 'The Manchester Way' or 'Life'. It's basically made up of different peoples stories about Manchester. Each story starts and finishes with a different person getting on and off a Stagecoach bus. The final story is about a guy from Hulme (completely fictional, of course) who grew up on an estate, got into skating and changed his life around. That's why they needed the park. All but one of the skaters are on the Projekts skate team; Jake, Lewis, Mark and Chris. The other skater is Nick Stansfield.



I was talking to a member of the film crew who told me that the film was funded by Manchester City Council Partnership. He also told me something very interesting, that the art work that this company had done for the film was too good and needed changing in case the public accused MCC of spending tax payers money on unneccesary promotional material. By making it look cheap, the council avoid any unwanted publicity, yet the price of the design probably increases by making it look cheap because they have to pay both companies for their design efforts. Ridiculous! This crew member also told me that the council tried to get them to make one of the stories include a family with a white mum and asian dad with a one black kid and one chinese kid. They refused, of course. People would have been watching the film trying to figure out what the heck had been going on with that family rather than enjoying the film.













The other thing about the film is that it's promotional film about Manchester's progresion; the way it's changing and opening up new facilities for the people living there. Ironically, our skatepark is not progressing and is in dire need of growth. We have been left for well over a year with no power, no lights, and not enough room for the skaters who need to use it. If, instead of spending thousands of pounds on promotional videos, the city council actually used the money to improve the facilities of places like ours, then the generqtion of the future might not be so disolusioned and may in fact feel like the authorities are there to help. I dought that will ever happen.

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Wednesday, March 01, 2006

Lord of the Park III

This is me doing a wall ride. Good fun.

The park is soon to get a face lift. We are holding a competition on 23rd April called Lord of the Park. It will be part of the Challenge Manchester: 100 Days campaign. The money raised from the comp will go towards a mini-ramp for the park. A long awaited change. From 10:00-12:00 we will have coaching sessions on a 35ft long temporary mini-ramp, then from 12:00 onwards the competition will run. Sponsors include Emerica, Es, Flip, Independent, Death, Landscape and Snickers, Manchester Leisure (a department of Manchester City Council) and Positive Futures.

More interestingly, the weather has got even colder. We thought it was improving but, alas, no. Snow is on its way. And I'm off snowboarding in Andora. If it's going to be cold I may as well enjoy it. It seems rather pointless having freezing weather but no snow to show for it, I think.

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