A few recent notable submits from one of our comrades holding it down overseas. Sergeant Gregory Opoien, from Minneapolis, will end his 18 month tour of duty within 4 weeks and can't wait to get back to America where "the skate spots are plenty and the locals don't shoot at you".

"Here are some photos of me skatin a ramp I built in Basrah, Iraq while deployed in support of OIF 09-10.  A buddy of mine and I built a bank that's about 3 ft high and 8ft long. The same guy got me a zero switchblade rail for Christmas last year, we've been skatin that thing like it won't be there tomorrow. A couple months ago a few pro bikers came to Basra for a demo they called "Bikes over Baghdad." They brought 2 huge quarter pipes, a massive flybox, and a killer box. Apparently they ramps were shipped intact from America on a C130 (military plane). We talked with Judd, who is pretty cool by the way, after the demo. He hooked me up with a deck and gave the box to my buddy who also skates. Unfortunately, the powers that be over here decided to dismantle the ramps and store them in an out of the way location. We reconstructed one of the quarters and used the wood from the flybox to build kind of a loading dock to pop tricks off of. We also built a kicker which is pretty sketchy but its solid enough to skate on".

SGT Opoien, Gregory
34ID G6 IA