Making Friends With The Neighbours

Laird Hamilton, post-feminist, period scientist and shark behaviour expert, appears to have a really great understanding of how menstruation works, what it's like, and how women manage their flow while surfing. He also makes a compelling argument for why women should be kicked out of lineups (at least once a month, but I'm guessing he'd prefer more often) - they attract sharks. 'The biggest, most common reason to be bitten is a woman with her period. Which people don't, you know, they don't even think about that. Uh, obviously if a woman has her period then there's a certain amount of blood in the water. So, but...' Laird, mate, if I was bleeding that badly, that I was leaking through all and any of the period products I was using and thus onto my clothes and swimmers, I would likely be in a bunch of pain and thus home in bed. Honestly. The community members of the wonderful  Surf Feminism Facebook page * (where I found the original Mpora link t...

Kids and parents play along the shoreline and the surf is busy: daughters and sons bobbing hopefully near their parents, awaiting instruction and/or parental pride; a Sunday Boardriders contest, the competitors gaudy in fluoro pink, green, yellow and blue rashees; young men positioned in the critical take-off spot, right next the rock shelf that generates this point break; older men on longer, thicker boards, knowing as much, or more, than the younger showponies, but betrayed by their bodies they wait further down the line, hungrily asserting themselves from the inside; those on the outside, avoiding the fray for all kinds of reasons: skills, age, vibe, preference, or some other knowledge about the break born from experience; and scattered throughout are women young and old, taking their time, staking their claims, with no distinctions between their skills and the others, the men – as far as I can observe they’re no worse or better at surfing. But I already knew that. On this warm, ...