Recap of the Santo Amaro Skatepark Inauguration Event

I skated the santo amaro skatepark a week before it officially opened. This night was the official inauguratory celebration for the skatepark, the skate scene, and the santo amaro favela people. We returned to the favela to witness the christening of the new park.

We showed up and the place was packed with people. music was blaring, people were on the microphone screaming, so i skated down in the soccer field with the little kids for a while.

It was down there that I met Felipe Motta, who is a graphic artist. He does work for Uprise skateshop in chicago. I have heard his name but never met him and it was awesome.

I helped Joao film some clips and then i went back up to the park to see what was happening.

People were sending it and the park itself is tiny. It was chaos and way more fun to watch than it would have been if i tried to skate. Lots of the local shredders were there so i just let them handle all the hard work and i just kinda mingled in spectator mode.

Tons of people were there. It was a huge success even before it started.

As the night went on i met various people.

As the night went on, the skating kept going. Cash for tricks was the format and people were getting handed dollar bills all over.

They were projecting lightpaintings onto the houses from the rooftop.

So i went down and got some of it for myself.

Back to the skating, So the unthinkable happened, you remember when I tried to ollie from the deck of that guy's house into the skatepark but bailed? well they just extended the contest with a $1000 R cash prize for who could ollie it first.

I forgot who ollied it first it was a dude who i dont know. but Then the unthinkable happened again, some badass gangster G in the favela was stoked on what was going on so he personally threw down $5000 to see someone kickflip it. Lets fucking GO.

I was stoked.

I knew how hard it was going to be to kickflip. but thats a lot of money. I almost wanted to get up there and try.

Feijas and Jordy battled the kickflip for probably 20 minutes. jumping down that thing over and over again.

But then, the ONE that i wasnt filming, he fucking stuck the landing and the crowd went crazy, you can see me in the orange shirt in the background throw my arms up like WTF! (in the video at the end of this post)

After that it was pretty chill, they just kinda had a party on the skatepark and everyone was just hangin out.

Props to this dude, the king of the event (someone mention him in the comments so i know his name). He kind of conceived of the idea to build this park and make it all happen. it took a long time to build and @pharra told me the stories of how much physical labor it was to get all the cement that deep into the favela, no roads so you have to haul it by hand.

I don't have any photos of me from the night except for this one of me and Grilo

Here is my edit from the night.

skateboarding is fucking awesome and this is living proof of how great it is and what it can do. Witness the power of the skateboarding community!