Skateboard contest? Why not? When there are young creative people, a lot of love, passion, fun, and no time – nothing is impossible. This sunny saturday 23rd of March was a pretty good example for that.  Let’s start from the beginning. What can connect 2 volunteers guys from France and German? Of course, except for the common continent. There can be something, passion and love to share. What can arise from this? Something big and amazing, trust me.

I’m Germain Picot, I’m an EVS volunteer in Prilep  from France.  The main idea of this event was to bring skateboarding back to Macedonian culture, Because there are a lot of young people that are beginners, but they don’t really have place to practice. And events like this contest, are usually only for professionals, so we want to promote the sport and help beginners to believe in themselves. I’m really proud of this project, I mean  not everything was like I wanted it to be, but it’s always like that. The most important is that if you have passion and you believe that you can do everything! Skateboarding is an amazing sport, it’s even more amazing when you are young, because it gives you motivation in live, and helps you to believe in yourself. I think it is sad that here in Macedonia, there is no promotion. That goes not only for skating, but for every hobby, be it art or dance or poetry. Young people are more focused on finding a job and earning money than developing their skill and chasing their dreams. I hope this event has shown, that they can have fun, have their hobbies and just enjoy their life!

I’m Peter Wagener, im from Germany. I’m a volunteer in Kavadarci since 1.5 years. One of my biggest projects here is that I made  a club for skateboarding. I brought 15 skateboards from germany, invited kids and introduced them to the sport. Many people were interested because there was no skating scene at all in Kavadarci. It has grown and grown and now its a complete collective. About this event… it was really crazy. Everything started with me and Germain. He told my that he is going to leave very soon, sadly, and he wants to organise an event before that, so i said: “okay, let’s make it big, let’s make it good”. A week ago we started organising. So everything you see here was made last week , except for the ramp. The whole town got involved and talked about it, and there were so many people, I couldn’t be happier. We had a classical skateboarding competition and over 20 people participated. They were between 8 and 28 years old, there is no wrong age to skate! The winners got a price, thanks to our sponsors. We also had a lot of little games, and it ended with an amazing fire show by a group from Prilep. The main idea was that in Kavadarci there was no skating community at all, so we wanted to make Kavadarci skate again. We wanted to show people how to skate and give them the opportunity to join for free. Just to promote the culture. The thing is that usually events like this are in Skopje and we wanted to bring it to smaller cities, to raise a new generations of skaters here.

Peter asked me if I can let him to organise the event at this place. I didn’t actually help with organization, but I take care of this place. I wanted to help him, because i respect his work and think that  young people sometimes need to have fun, go to a party and just relax!
Lanche, 20   Kavadarci

Im here to talk with the young people and have some fun, im skating since 2 months and took part in the competition, the whole event was amazing!
Sara, 16 Prilep

I started skating one month ago because my sister gave me a skateboard as a present. I practised all the time with Peter in Prilep. Today she brought me here and supported me during the competition  in which i was the youngest participant.
ddddddddddddddddddddddd  Mathey, 9 ,Prilep 2nd place

Actually I’m not a skater but a surfer, but my fellow volunteers told me that today there will be a good party, where i can meet some people and chill. I came to Macedonia because I wanted to change my life, because studying engineering was a little boring and i wanted to improve my art skills.
Jose, volunteer in Prilep from Spain

I came here to have some fun, because in our city we don’t have a lot of things to do. I’m not skating but the party was amazing, the fire show was the best!
Christian, 8  Kavadarci

This competition was really amazing, nobody did it before like that. when i started skating there was nobody skating and then Germain came to Prilep and he connected and moved our community. It was really intense.  I learned a lot of new trick and practiced a lot. Making the first place today was completely unexpected. I’m not really professional so it was a nice suprises. That’s the point, this kind of events give us the opportunity to believe in ourselves.
Nikola, 18 Prilep 1st place

                                                                                                                             Dorota Lyczak