A More Women+ Surf clinic. photo/Miranda Rico
Surf’s Up, For Everyone!
My friend and fellow beer tour guide, Jeff Lyons, has been working on a film about surfing in Maine. Among the many people he interviewed was Pamela Chévez, a co-founder of More Women+ Surf, a Maine organization dedicated to “making waves toward equity” by offering surfing opportunities to members of marginalized groups heretofore underrepresented in the sport. Jeff’s interview with Chévez won’t be included in his film, so he offered it to me for my research.
Chévez told Jeff More Women+ Surf began when she and a friend were making their own short film, about female surfers in Maine. They realized they didn’t know many women who surfed, though they recognized a dozen or so from the beach. “It’s kind of intimidating, but we decided to reach out to the girls that we knew who surf,” Chévez said. “And eventually they reached out to more girls, and it was just an explosion of, Hey, there’s gonna be this meet-up at the beach. Like, There’s gonna be a photographer and they’re gonna film something. So people joined.”
At that film shoot, Chévez and her colleague further realized there was much more to do here than just one short. Many of the women were asking when the next meet-up would be, so more group-surfing events were scheduled and attendance grew. Some of the surfers wanted instruction, not just encouragement, so about a half dozen women volunteered to coach monthly clinics. After a few of these, Chévez — who is from Mexico but only began surfing after moving to Maine — realized gender wasn’t the only thing imbalanced on these waves.
“I noticed there were just two people of color in the water,” she said. “There was a lack of cultural diversity, [which created] a little barrier for you to cross to feel like you’re welcome in a space. Not because the people weren’t nice, because the girls are super nice. … But what is intimidating is that you don’t speak the same cultural language.”
Chévez said the new group’s mission shifted “to bring women of underrepresented communities into the water, and to create access for them, to allow them to enjoy the things that we enjoy as the privileged people we are.”
“It doesn’t matter that I’m an underrepresented person based on my color,” Chévez said in the interview. “I have a privilege that some other people don’t have.” This, despite the fact she was still waiting for her immigration paperwork and had no money when she started surfing. Andy McDermott and Crystal Ouimette of Black Point Surf Shop in Scarborough lent her a board and encouraged her to begin. “They literally opened the door to me to get me in the water,” she recalled. Now she’s paying it forward.
More Women+ Surf’s programs include Melanin’s Up, which offers surf clinics for BiPOC individuals and families; Boards N’ Pals, which provides clinics for women+ and members of the LGBTQ+ community; and Skate to Relate, a skateboard therapy program for underserved youth that prioritizes those in BiPOC and low-income communities. Although More Women+ Surf charges a modest fee for its clinics, gear is provided and scholarships are available.
The organization has six staff members and many more volunteers who pitch in to share their passion for surfing. “It’s really nice, you know, like that kind of community, giving just to share something you love,” Chévez said. “I found it’s really warming in Maine, even though that’s contradictory, because it’s pretty cold up here. But it can be such a warming place, as well.”
Share news about the amateur sport you love with Tom Major at leagueofbollards@gmail.com.
