1982 – BMXs and Malvern Stars

As in all bygone era the quicker your mode of transport, and the further you could go with that transport at minimum cost meant more freedom. I had numerous forms of transport, including a plastic skateboard about the size of a small broken child’s leg. Which is what these fucking death traps were designed for. They were cheaply made, and extremely dangerous so we all had at least one. We used to ride these hideous things down the hill at Union Street and turn into Kentucky Road at breakneck speed. That’s if you actually made it to the bottom of Union Street hill.

Union Street was a long street starting off Roosevelt Avenue, near the dreaded houso two towers, and went all the way to Riverwood Park. Union Street had the Riverwood Primary school, lots of red brick, soul-numbing, housing commission flats, and strangely enough, some privately owned houses that weren’t shit. Union Street was also poorly constructed and very poorly maintained. The road was made from razor blades, and the sharp teeth of dead children and was held together by the blood of the angry ancients. Okay, it was just a very rough surface and it meant death to anyone who fell onto a bike, scooter, or in this case a death trap skateboard.

I was on my bike at the top of Union Street looking down the hill on my way home from purchasing $1’s worth of hot chips for the family lunch. A smelly boy, possibly the friend of a friend, or possibly a murderous psychopath, grabbed hold of the back of my seat.

‘Take us down the hill,’ he proposed through a set of half-busted teeth. Smelly Kid was standing on a red plastic skateboard, about the size of a large book, which had surely seen better days. As I was already on my way I didn’t say anything, and he simply held on and traveled with me down the hill. Until of course, the inevitable death wobbles took hold of his very untrustworthy mode of transportation. He pushed me to one side to try and gain balance. I of course zigged, when I should have zagged, and got into some balance versus momentum problems of my own.

‘Faaaaaarrrkkkk,’ was the general cry of distress from both of us. Smelly Kid let go just as I was overcorrecting and ended up sliding 5 metres into the gutter on my left leg. My left leg was grinding against the poorly build road and the skin is taking off on the road kindly acted as a break to slow my momentum. Smelly kid seemed to wobble a few more metres and then corrected himself as he gained absurd speed and swept around the corner into Kentucky Road. Smelly Kid was the afternoon hero as kids a few kids on skateboards skated past and were applauding his skills and courage. Meanwhile, half my leg was left on Union Street as I hobble back home where I cleaned the scrape and put some Mercurochrome on it, which stung like a bitch, made a mess, and made my whole leg look like an uncooked lobster for about 2 days.

Ronnie lived in near me, in a house on what we could ‘The Triangle’. The name of the road was called Idahoe Place and it had a strange layout where townhouses were lined up on one side of the triangle, a few houses on the other side and Kentucky Road made up a little bit of the triangle. The actual Triangle itself had fuck all use and was generally dry and unusable with a couple of trees and weeds up to your knees splattered throughout. This left a bleak and horrible landscape just strutting out, being of no use to the community. Ronnie lived in the first townhouse in from Kentucky Road, and a kid called Albert lived in the last townhouse. These townhouses were built on a spur line that tapered down from Ronnie’s place into Albert's place meaning Ronnie had a steep driveway and Albert had a not so sweeping driveway.

All three of us were sitting in the not-so-steep driveway of Albert's townhouse, when Ronnie got the brightest idea of his life, ‘Let’s go and see who can skate down my driveway without falling off.’ After carefully examining just how fucking stupid this was I said ‘Great idea numb nuts, you first.’
‘Nah, nah fuck that for a ball sport. How bout you Albert or are you a gutless wonder?’ And there it was. The dare. The dare that could not and should not be avoided. The young teenage boy trying to impress his peers is as funny as a grown man trying to impress their peers only a shade more fucked up and more creative.

‘Fuck it then, let’s put a ramp so you can do a jump into the triangle and we will see how far we can jump.’ Ronnie was beside himself now, knowing that Albert just might be amazingly gullible and actually give this a go. The thing about Albert was he was a wog. His parents were from Europe, which was probably near England or something, and he was trying to make friends and impress us. Albert would have impressed the fuck out of me by simply telling Ronnie to lick his skiddy underpants and fuck off. To no avail. ‘It’s not so dangerous’, he says. ‘I will bring my scooter and we will build the ramp.’ After a quick trip to the tip to find suitable materials, the ‘not so on the dangerous’ ramp, was built.
The steep drop into a gutter and then into a stretch of sharp poorly constructed bitumen road, and the into a ramp that was built in a 20-minute period, daunted Albert not one bit. The ramp had no redeeming qualities and each component was unconnected to the other components and disobeyed all laws of engineering and physics.

Growing up in the 1980s meant a few things. You could smoke. Anywhere. On buses, trains, at work, at the movie theatre, and even on planes. Smoke everywhere. The smell of expensive pre-rolled Winfield’s to the dank, toxic stench of cheap Drum, the roll-yourself type of tobacco. The 80’s also meant bad haircuts and more importantly the unnatural art of Bicycle Motor Cross, commonly known as BMX. The bikes that you used to take part in this activity were also called ‘BMX’. My BMX was cool. Super cool. It had 20-inch black tires with yellow trimming around the outside of each tire.

The local council at Riverwood set up a BMX bike track at Rotary Park to keep us youngsters busy and off the streets. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn’t. Once you mastered the three or so obstacles and only fell off every now and again, you would get bored and therefore, creative. We would build ramps from CHEP pallets ‘borrowed from a British Paints factory next to the park and make the as steep as we dared. Using a hill of the track to gain momentum you would pedal as fast as you could, launching yourself into a half orbit, praying to whoever was listening to land on your back wheel.

Landing on your front wheel would cause two things. First of all, if there was enough momentum from you and the back half of your BMX you would head over the handles bars. This was not good. At all. As you went over the handlebars you had to duck your head and manage a sideway twist, followed by a half roll on the hard-packed stones that lay beneath you. This is a major gymnastic move mastered by the true faithful of the BMX fraternity. This move was commonly known as ‘going arse over tit’. The bike would then follow you in this spin and inevitably smack you either in very sensitive areas or your head. No helmets in the 1980s folks, and we were more than likely to have no shoes on.
Secondly, landing on your front wheel and putting on the abovementioned demonstration, would put the watchers of this affair into hysterical conniptions. The laughter and cheering could be heard for miles.

Another great thing about the 1980s was video games. ‘No good is going to come out of these pooters son’, decried my father. ‘People think they are going to make a living out this electrickery gizmo’s. That’ll be the day.’ Little did he know.
So I found myself inside a Milk Bar where these video games were, with my trusty BMX parked outside in a lovely blind spot to me. Another thing about the 1980s. No need for bike locks right? Wrong. I came out into the blinding sun, after playing Galaga for 45 minutes, and my trusty steed had vanished. I looked for that bike for days. Kicked down some doors, and rustled some feathers of the local hoods. All to no avail.
I lamented my loss for 18 months and then on my 11th birthday my Uncle, now my Aunty gave me a 12 Speed Malvern Star. BMXs were for children. Adults had 12-speed racing machines. I loved that Malvern Star.