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[The River] [The River p3]

The River

The 1980ies might be the decade that will not be recycled fashion-wise. Clothing and hair style were just too bizarre to become repeated. But it was nevertheless an “anything goes” decade, especially surf-wise in Germany. Windsurfing was the big thing but many of us were traveling to the Atlantic to sail in waves. But often there was waves and no wind and people started to take surfing into consideration. As many were already pretty good in wavesailing and used to sail small boards, plenty underestimated the challenge of learning how to surf. This and the lack of surfboards and any knowledge about surfing often led to the mistake of starting to surf with boards that were way too small.

I made the same mistake and started my very short shaping career with building a tiny but colourful down in the cellar of my parent´s house. I had taken the shape from an add in one of the few issues of Surfer magazine, that had made it to Germany. I managed to carve something out of the blank that roughly resembled a surfboard. Something roughly resembling a thruster – but fitted with only two fins – was the result of my efforts plus poisoning the house for a few days with the fumes of the epoxy laminate.

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