Red Bull's 'Skate Tales' Visits The Uganda Skateboard Society

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Red Bull‘s ‘Skate Tales’ series is a deep dive into the lesser-known subcultures in skateboarding—groups that just keep doing their own thing, whether we see it or not. The six-part exploration of this underground element, hosted by famous outlier Madars Apse, which takes you from Japan to the Ethiopian skate scene, continues today with The Uganda Skateboard Society. (All photos are by Gaston Francisco.)

Red Bull's 'Skate Tales' Visits The Uganda Skateboard Society

Madars Apse doing an ollie through a tire in Mukono, Uganda on October 21, 2021

The Uganda Skateboard Society has recently launched a fundraiser with the goal of raising money to buy land to build their next skatepark. In 2016 the local skaters in Uganda built a DIY skatepark, which has formed a cornerstone of the Uganda Skateboard Society and become a gathering place for skaters in the area. The community is now at a place where they are looking to raise funds to purchase land for the new home of skateboarding in Uganda, so that they can buy enough land to have a store and an office as well as a new skatepark. Learn more here.

Madars Apse doing a frontside ollie in Mukono, Uganda on October 21, 2021

The true unit of measurement in skateboarding is heart and not skill. Skateboarding doesn’t require skill to begin with, but it demands heart from day one. The people who gain most from skating are those to whom it means most, and you will go a long way before you find more pure skateboarding passion than within our main man Gose Gerald and the Ugandan Skateboarding Society. This episode of Skate Tales sees Latvian pro skater extraordinaire and man of the people Madars Apse enlist Tyler Surrey to go and meet the skate crew who built their own unique park from plans off the internet, and then started to create their own moves!

Madars Apse doing a 50-50 between a crowd in Mukono, Uganda on October 21, 2021

One magic facet of skateboarding is that it adapts to the environment in which it finds itself, from the downhills of Brazil to the built environment of Japanese cities. In Uganda, Madars finds the local skate crew ripping their own mini-mega ramp doing tricks and learns from rulers like Rashid Sserunjogi, Travor Kanyike, Shanitah Blessings, and Brian Bukenya what skateboarding has offered them and their hopes for where it may yet take them.