Skateboard through Joburg streets with Ayanda Mnyandu

If Durban has the Golden Mile and Cape Town has the mountain, then Johannesburg has its people. People who know each other, who know places and who know what it’s like to be passionate about a city that’s certainly not going to be winning any “Most Beautiful” prizes any time soon.

That’s precisely what Ayanda Mnyandu, founder of City Skate Tours, loves about Joburg: its people, and that they are like portals. “Because this is a city of migrants, it operates in silos. There’s the inner city, then Melville, then Rosebank, and you might know one area particularly well, yet have no insight into another — until you meet someone who does. Then the city becomes fascinating. Everything I know about Joburg is because someone helped me to discover it — that’s what we do for each other.”

It's also what he strives to do through City Skate Tours. Mnyandu aims to introduce newcomers to this ever-changing shape-shifter of a metropolis by explaining its history and, in so doing, shedding light on why it is the way it is today — all while skateboarding.

Why the unusual mode of transport? For one thing, Mnyandu is intrigued by subcultures. He's had his skateboard by his side since he moved to Troyeville in 1995, when he was about five years old. Almost every child in the suburb used to skate (“since the older kids were always skating in the bowl, even the younger kids wanted to get into skateboarding”), so it wasn’t a big deal when he soon got his own board, though in those days it was used as a go-kart for racing, rather than to try out ollies and fakies. Those came as he grew older, until skateboarding was an intrinsic part of his life. “It wasn’t just about having fun — it became an entire lifestyle,” Mnyandu recalls. Everything from his fashion choices to his lingo was influenced by skating: the subculture became his substrate. Many years on, little has changed, which means there's no-one better to help others discover Johannesburg through its skating hotspots.

And there are several, starting with Maboneng, the city’s creative hub and home to Skateistan (an international skateboarding and education youth empowerment NPO); Marshalltown, where Mnyandu describes Library Gardens (or LBGs, as skaters know it) as “the spiritual home of skateboarding in Johannesburg”; and Newtown, where street art and graffiti have transformed an area that's always been the heartbeat of the city.

Put them all together and they tell the tale of the City of Gold and how it’s grown from a rush town during the 1800s to a centre that’s birthing new movements in art and culture, even as it becomes the home of choice to a growing number of young professionals.

The skateboards add another dimension to the discovery of these stories. Mnyandu explains that the idea came to him when he was working at an NPO. “I’d become disenchanted with my job, but I wasn’t sure what to do next,” he says. An economics graduate, he thought about applying his degree, until a friend in asset management advised him to find his passion, then build a business model around it. “My passion was skateboarding,” he says simply. “I thought: you have walking tours and cycling tours — why not skateboarding tours? I’d teach people how to skateboard, then skate and walk them through my city, telling them stories about the buildings and architecture.”

At first, City Skate Tours was a lucrative and exciting side hustle, but after attending Pushing Boarders, a skateboarding conference in 2019, where topics under discussion included the role of skateboarding in urban spaces, Mnyandu decided to take the concept further.

His timing turned out to be spectacularly poor — Covid and its lockdowns came only a few days later, immediately after he handed in his resignation in February 2020. But, he says, while no-one anticipated the pandemic and its effects, he had prepared himself for tough times. “It was a totally new, unique concept. I accepted that I’d have some difficulty getting it off the ground, so I was ready to spend many months consolidating plans.” After joining business incubators the SEED Academy and reading extensively on the subject of niche businesses, Mnyandu was ready for a formal launch once restrictions were lifted.

Times have changed though. Where once tourists were attracted to the idea of trying something novel and adventurous, in the post-Covid era they are looking for something more: they want to connect with a community and a culture.

City Skate Tours has responded to this by extending its offering. After fielding queries about Johannesburg’s graffiti and street art, Mnyandu introduced a separate tour focusing on this inner-city element.

He’s also launched a walking tour of Braamfontein, crafting an experience which hinges on introducing tour members to the culture and people who own the stores and spaces, from the vinyl shops to the coffee shops and cultural curators, so they can get to know their stories.

Next, he plans to find a way to allow others to benefit from the success of City Skate Tours.

In the meantime, he relishes watching people see his beloved city unspool before them. “My tours don’t end with the tour itself — I always invite those who've joined me to come with me to the next thing, whether it’s going to a party, dancing at a drum-and-bass or hip-hop party, or checking out a new exhibition, or checking out a cool rooftop like the Living Room or Hallmark House. I want them to talk to the people who walk past us. So the tour becomes more than an experience that lasts a few hours. It becomes part of the story of Johannesburg itself.”

Book a tour here.

Skater slang that will have you ruling cool

When signing up for Skate City Tours, you don't have to be a professional or even proficient skater, but you might like to up your cool quotient and impress Ayanda by dropping some slang from the Urban Surfer's Guide to Skate Lingo:

Snake

Example: “Stop being a snake.”

Definition: A snake is somebody who cuts in front of other people at a skate park or keeps going when it isn’t their turn. Kids on scooters are the best examples of this, mainly due to the high volume of them, but anybody can be a snake. Make sure it isn’t you because nobody likes snakes.

Sketchy

Example: “You landed that trick so sketchy.” “That flat-bank is so sketchy.”

Definition: Basically it means not very good. If you were drawing something you would do a sketch before the final, neat version. Same goes here. It could be a wobbly landing, your feet just touching the board or a badly constructed skate park. 

Clean

Example: “That nose slide was really clean.”

Definition: The opposite of sketchy. So if somebody says you landed a trick clean, it's a compliment.

ABD and NBD

Example: “Kevin did an NBD at the skate park yesterday.”

Definition: ABD stands for already been done. So if you do a new trick over a gap and your friend says ABD, it means somebody else has done that trick on that gap.

NBD is an acronym for never been done. So using the same example of a trick over a gap, if you were the first person to do it, that’s an NBD.

Powerslide

Example: “Just powerslide to slow down.”

Definition: It's basically a skid, a way to slow your speed down by turning the board ninety degrees. Apart from slowing you down, it looks good and is super fun. Just beware of flatspots.

Stop Stone

Example: “I hit a stop stone right after landing that trick.”

Definition: Skateboarder kryptonite is the best way I can think to describe it. It doesn’t get more frustrating than cruising along and hitting one. All it is is a small, perfectly sized rock (about 1cm or smaller) that wedges in to prevent your wheel from spinning, abruptly causing your board to stop and sending you flying face first to the floor. You never see them and they usually stymie you in front of large crowds.

Flatspot

Example: “His board sounds like a tractor because of his flatspot.”

Definition: A flatspot is exactly that, a flat spot on your wheel which results in a horrible noise that gets worse the faster you go. Flatspots can be the result of powerslides or hitting a small stone that stops your board with a small skid.

Steeze/Steezy

Example: “Johnny’s got a really steezy tre flip.”

Definition: It’s just joining style with ease. So, do something that’s stylish and make it look easy = steezy. For a good example, hit YouTube and watch Tom Penny skate.

Bail

Example: “That bail looked like it hurt.”

Definition: A bail is when you fall off the board while trying to land a trick. It doesn’t matter if it hurt or not, it's still a bail.

Hill Bomb

Example: “Do you fancy doing a hill bomb on the way home?”

Definition: Going fast down a hill. It’s as hard as you want to make it, but an amazing feeling.