Ramesh’s blog This is Me!!

Goodbye old Coyote!!

It was in my eight grade way
back in 1982 that I got my skateboard – a Grentec Coyote GT bright red
colour skateboard. Back then my parents had moved to Jakarta having picked up a
new job. My neighbours were mostly Indonesians with a few Indian families here
and there. There was one other boy – my namesake Ramesh Mishra who lived a
short distance away from where I lived. He was one year my senior in school and
his dad worked with mine. He had a light blue Grentec Coyote GT
skateboard. It was he who got me to learn the ropes of skateboarding – not that
I went on to become a skateboarder par excellence or anything of that sort.

For several years from then I had treasured my
skateboard as I did most of my toys. The skateboard if any was perhaps the only
piece that really connected me with the one wonderful year that I had spent in Jakarta.
It surely brought back memories of many a fall I have had on CempakaPutih Tenga lanes as I learnt to
skate and I can still remember that extremely painful bump that developed
almost instantaneously after one of those very nasty falls. So big and ugly it
looked that I remember my friend and I kept looking at it in complete
amazement. I can also remember holding onto Ramesh’s bicycle and being towed
along to either the nearest convenience store or across the length and breadth
of Cempakaputih Tenga colony.

From time to time all it needed was a wash and
a little greasing up and it was as good as new and it was not uncommon for
Ramesh and I to compete on who was going to give his skateboard the best
squeaky clean scrub. I remember I once got my hands on two long stickers from
one of the Kellogs corn flakes packet and I had stuck them on the skateboard
just to add extra colour to it. After all these years of extreme rough use on
practically every kind of terrain, I must admit the skateboard’s design was way
way ahead of its times.

Several years later , it was just last year when my
older son finally came up to the seventh grade, that I - with  mixed feeling of reluctance to part with and
pride that I had managed to take care of my skateboard so well all these years
-  gave it to him asking him to be
extremely careful. After all I had taken good care of it for the next
generation to use. My son seemed to be making reasonably good progress learning
to jump off the foot path and things like that. On weekends I too would take
time to try my hand at it. Sadly,this evening when I got back from my son (now
in the eight grade) sat there with a crestfallen look. It took a bit of asking
around the household to be told that he had lost the skateboard. I don’t know
if he was upset or if he was more worried at being yelled at by me. There is no
denying that I was upset but I told him that there was no point now in crying
over spilt milk. However, I made a point to tell him to learn from this
mistake.

As for my Coyote .. for the many miles of fun
and thrill and for the great memories you will always bring to me Thankyou !

09 Oct 11 - Just came back on to update this blog. The stolen skateboard has finally been recovered Phew !!

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