AREGULING SURFCLUB

All images are available as NFT and prints, please contact me for pricing.

All the revenue will go to support Areguling Surfclub.

A few years back I was heart broken and left for the Indonesian archipelago to surf and recharge. Little did I know. A friend in Bali recommended a beach called Areguling, with a beautiful right hand wave in the southern part of the island of Lombok. The swell was good and the waves were perfect and powerful. I remember riding my motorbike to the surf in the tropical mornings on the dirt roads, with bare feet, only boardshorts and the wind in my hair. It was a pure feeling of joy and freedom, a garland of flowers, an offering to my old life.

I got to know Takim, Win, John and a few other local wave riders who were selling photos from the surf. Every evening I went to see what pictures they got. On one of the last days I went out with a couple of them on the boat to surf. Some twenty minutes into the session I fell on a wave and BAM! I felt the hard impact from the board shake me but I didn’t know exactly what happened. When I got my head above the surface I checked my teeth, they were all right then I saw all the blood in the water pulsating from my face. Fortunately I was conscious and I managed to paddle to the boat. The facial expression of Najam, the driver, told me I wasn’t pretty. John took me on the back of my bike to the nearest clinic who referred me to the hospital in Mataram where they concluded I broke the left part of my face, cheek bone, nose bone, bones supporting the eye, nerve damage etc. Eventually I made it back to Sweden where I had plastic surgery. Life had taken an unexpected turn and the healing process has been long. One friend made a beautiful reflection:

“It is like life cracked your porcelain mask open for the real you to come out.”

One part of the healing journey has been returning to Areguling to get back in the saddle again. On all these visits I have deepened the relationship with the crew that helped me out of the water and now I have many wonderful friends in the Areguling village. They run the Areguling Surfclub where the younger boys in the village can borrow boards and get surf coaching. Some of the boys compete on a national level in Indonesia. To finance their activities they guide tourists and teach them how to surf. Covid has really hit this business hard.

On my last visit I snapped a bunch of analoge shots. Here are some of them.

The images are available as NFT’s or prints.

All the revenue will go to support Areguling Surfclub.

Warning, the images below contain injuries, not for the sensitive person.