Skate competition

On the last Saturday we were there, All Nations Church had their 4^th annual skate competition. Churches and skate parks aren’t an instantly connected thing in my mind (or anyone’s, probably), but I think it’s brilliant. The church has large – and surprisingly nice – skate park in the corner of the parking lot. It’s legitimate; not just a few ramps scattered around between cars, but a fenced-off area with a halfpipe, multiple ramps/rails, quarterpipes against the church wall, and plenty of space to skate around. Skaters and BMXers come from miles around to skate there – sometimes from other cities. That’s because the park is the only one in Windhoek. Until a skate park opened up in Swakopmund a few months ago, it was the only one in Namibia.

So it’s popular. Kids and adults come throughout the week, and it’s a great ministry opportunity; Paul goes out there often to get to know the kids, show them love, minister to them. The competition draws a huge crowd of skaters and their families. They turn into a kind of fair – they had a giant, hollowed-out Sprite can, from which volunteers sold soda all day. Fuse iced tea gave away free samples; a local skating company had a booth set up to showcase and sell boards, trucks, wheels, and other skating paraphernalia. (They also donated most of the prizes for the competition.) There was lots of food – bratwursts, burgers, blue (blue!) velvet cupcakes that were absolutely phenomenal, popcorn. There was face painting and coffee and a spin-art thing made by one of the kids from the church and a game where you used a slingshot (or “catty”) to hit a target for a prize.

A lot of people helped (including our team), but the fair was organized by a woman who was one of the church elders, a former church employee, and former professional event planner. Her name was Kay-Leigh (not sure about the spelling there.) She did an awesome job; the day went really well.

Two guys from South Africa were in town all week to help prepare for it. This was the first year they had joined the competition planning – they were invited because they run a Christian skate and surf ministry in their home country. One of the guys, Brad, had founded the ministry there; he organized the contest details, did humerous play-by-play announcing on the PA during the competition, judged the skaters (along with his friend, Heinrich), and gave out the prizes.

During the intro and prizes, they inserted prayers and mentions of Jesus, reminding everyone why they, a church, were putting this on. It was very cool. Elisa and I got to stand up and share a (very) brief statement about how much God loved the skaters, and encouraged them to live out their desires and dreams for Him.

Our team helped out in a variety of ways. The day before, we helped clean up the skate park, move tables, make raffle tickets, and other stuff. The day of the event, we helped man the front booth, where they were selling raffle tickets/balloons; talked to people in the crowds and invited them to come to church events; ran back and forth to get things, deliver messages, or whatever else Kay-Leigh needed in the moment. Lauren and Brianna helped out at the Fuse table, giving out samples for hours. Elisa took tons of photos (having been asked by the church to be an official photographer – they had another guy taking video.)

It was a fun day.