Surfing as a black woman is a very unusual sight. Rarely, do you see a lot of diversity in extreme sports, especially surfing. However, I dare to be different because I don’t want to live my life following a set path. Following my dreams is important to me and somewhere on my list of desires, dreams and things to try was surfing. My experience surfing as a black girl starts with a board and crazy kinky hair.
I’ve always enjoyed the beach and watching the surfers catch a wave. Maybe that’s just the Californian in me. I love the carefree, laidback attitude that comes with the surfing community. I was a teen when I really started getting into surfing. I would go to Morro Bay, California which was like a two and a half hour drive from my hometown of Bakersfield, and take long walks on the beach.
One thing was for certain, I wanted to try surfing. I started getting glued to really learning about the sport. I would watch movies like Blue Crush, Soul Surfer and anything related to the topic of surfing. All I knew is that I wanted to be out in those waves too.
‘Don’t touch my hair.’ Is that not one of the top stereotypical statements that are attached to black women? Come off it.
These types of statements and stereotypes are what creates a lack of diversity in sports such as surfing. It’s more than just saying don’t touch my hair. It’s the assumption that people of color don’t want to surf, kayak or whatever sport may fit because they don’t want to get their hair wet. Which lessens the self-esteem for a person like myself.
I straightened my hair during my surfing crave stage and worried what I would look like with crazy kinky hair after getting in the ocean. But the truth is though its a low number there are black people who surf.
During my junior year of high school, I told myself that I would do it all. I wasn’t going to hold myself back from doing things I wanted to do because I was scared of what people think. I went to my junior formal solo, joined the swim team after tennis season ended and I decided to take surf lessons.
The weird thing about trying something new is the days before doing that particular activity you become very nervous. But then when you actually do what you wanted to do all your worries go away. That was the exact feeling I had when I went surfing for the first time.
When I was out in the water my hair was no longer my main concern nor was being a black woman on a board. To be honest, I’m happy that I was that random black girl out surfing. Hopefully, it inspired other girls of color to try surfing out too.
“Yea, I was pretty nervous about surfing for the first time. In my mind, I had all these obstacles set that I thought I would never manage to get over. I thought to myself, what if I’m too fat that I can’t fit into my wetsuit? What if the waves take me out to sea and I drown? There were a lot of what ifs. All I can say now is all the stressing was a waste of time because I got out there and did it. Wetsuit and all. I rode waves like a true surfer girl.”
“I walked out into the ocean with my board held to my side, wetsuit tight and firm against my skin, ready to achieve a dream. I fell a couple of times but you never truly learn something tell you fall and try again. I had a blast and just getting out there and trying was even better because now I know I love surfing as much as I thought I did.”
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