Afri Amu, hopes for the Afghan surf team

It is difficult to write your own story when world events always seem to reset narratives to war, terror and division.

The irony wasn't lost this morning on #ISAworlds' first #AfghanSurf competitor Afri Amu as he stared at the ocean under heavy media scrutiny: here is a man who has gathered the Afghan diaspora around #surfing, created Wave Riders Association of Afghanistan (@infowraa), organised #surf championships and managed to garner enough support from @isasurfing and the Afghan government to be able to start talking about a #Tokyo2020 Olympics team with a dreamy smile.

Today though, it's all about managing that #surfheat, battling the choppy conditions... inspiring future Afghan generations and making your family proud, a tall order! But if you think of Afri's story from the beginning, escaping Kabul, living in Russia, Germany, studying hard, discovering surfing and taking it further than any of us would, putting on a World Surfing Games jersey, battling it out with himself as his family who flew in for the occasion sees him for the first time in waves, he owned it already. And he reminds us that the only things of real value grow when we start sharing them: #love, #stoke, #stories.

🙏 #Manchester @surfingengland. 📷✒: @_laurence_b #reallifestoke