heard a guy by the name of Alex was coming to japan to chase a typhoon. i haven’t heard of him in my life. this guy is supposed to be a pro wave big surfer who chases big waves around the world. anyway, i really don’t keep up with the surf media these days because there are just so many new faces on the surf scene. don’t know who’s who anymore. so when he pulled up with his videographer, thought to myself, “here is another foreigner who probably saw the Surfer magazine last year with John John Florence on some huge waves in japan. in fact, the whole world seen that issue and i bet there are many other surfers like Alex coming to japan in search for that wave.
anyway, he pulls up, i talk story with him and tell him the bad news. or should i say, reality. “hey, John John guys were luck last year. they scored the swell of the century. scoring waves like that in japan is like winning the lottery.” then i showed him a photo of a barreling japanese wave i surfed 2 weeks prior, he looked at it, and said “i want to go there now!” haha. unfortunately it doesn’t work that way. the sand bank is different, the swell is wrong, the wind is wrong, and everything was wrong for that spot to be working for typhoon 15. instead, we were at another river mouth that worked on that kind of swell and wind but the waves weren’t as big as he wanted it to be. you could just tell he was bummed because of all the driving, all the hassles, and all the money he put into this trip.
he managed to get a few waves on the first day but instead of 10′ barrels, he was surfing chest high fun waves. i was really impressed on this big wavers small wave attack.
he asked me “what’s next?” i told him that i can’t help him. i knew where i was going the next day and also knew that it was forbidden to take any visitors there. and me being a visitor myself, i would have been in a lot of trouble if i showed up with a famous pro surfer from california, along with his videographer. no, i’m not an asshole, i just respect the locals and know right from wrong. Alex jumped back into his car and went his way. i jumped on the train and went my way.
2 days later, through mutual friends, Alex ended up at the same spot i was surfing. yeah, he showed up a day late, but better than nothing. lucky he knew some locals that let him surf. so we wax up, paddle out, and get some unbelievable waves. Alex told me that this day (his last day), made his whole trip memorable. we surfed, he got barreled, jumped into his car, and went to the airport for the mentawai’s. a busy guy but also a very lucky guy. i ended up liking him for the person he is. he just has so much determination to get the dream wave and won’t give up to get there. he’s is also a very nice person. knows how to respect locals and knows how to be friendly. as we paddled out and watched the waves barreling in front of us, i told him “welcome to japan you lucky foreigner.” thank you naohiro for taking this photo.
thank you again naohiro for taking this photo too. here is Alex Grey in a dream barrel he came to japan to search for. well Alex, you found it. keep things a secret and hope to see you somewhere in japan next typhoon. it was nice to meet you. keep on charging!
