Roller Disco

Last week, a group of the girls here discovered a student night at a roller disco place in South London. So, when Thursday student night rolled around (pun intended) we decided we would take a study break and attend. We got into our ‘disco-wear’ and tubbed it over to Vauxhall Station. After walking around for 5 minutes lost, we took a chance and walked down some sketchy alleyway. Low-and-behold the risk paid off, for the disco place was hidden in the side street. Since it was student night, it was only 6 pounds with roller skates included. Super worth it.

Here is the link to the roller disco site- watch the youtube clip. It is HILARIOUS. 

http://www.rollerdisco.com/

Mind you- I haven’t been roller-skating in a while now. It used to be everyone’s birthday party back in the day, but even then I would do rollerblading. I got my skates, but them in and was confronted with the truth. Not only do I have little balance, but also I am just bloody awful at roller-skating.

The roller disco place had two small rinks. One of them had funk music from the 70s and 80s and the other one, as we came to learn, was the ‘more advanced’ ring that played…ghetto rap? This is going to come off as wrong buuuut….we were one of the only white people there. Not that it’s a bad thing; I just never thought roller-skating was a thing. We started our night in the advanced ring, which was a HUGE mistake. I was not prepared for the speed and the massive amounts of people just doing tricks around me. Moreover, it was somewhat uncomfortable. The girls would just stand outside the ring and watch the men skate around. Also, as I was singing along with Jay-Z’s “Dirt off your shoulder” I got multiple judging looks. I ran into at least 3 girls and got yelled at for stopping in the rink. Basically, I was asked to leave the advanced ring since I was ‘not keeping up with the speed of the other skaters.’ Whatever! Haters gonna hate! The group I was with ended up moving to the other ‘intermediate’ ring and dancing to The Jackson 5 and Aretha Franklin.

The 'intermediate' ring 

Our disco outfits

Looking fabulous in our skates.

I forgot how tiring roller-skating is to be honest. My thighs were killllling me by the end of the night. I was sweating...While skating around was so much fun and made me feel 5 again, half of the fun was sitting there watching the pros dance around. I never thought I would be in a roller-skating rink with a bunch of adults, who took skating so seriously. They all owned their own skates, had them tricked out, and had season passes. They could break dance with the skates on, do all these dangerous moves, and all the time I was watching all I could think of is “I WISH I WAS WEARING MY MOUTHGUARD.” But seriously….I wish I had brought my mouthguard…We ended up befriended some pro-skaters and they tried to teach us a couple tricks. Since I have no balance or grace, I was embarrassingly awful. The other kids in my group though got to do some fun stuff. I turned into the mini cheering squad. I just have no coordination, I swear!

Anyways, that was probably the goofiest and spontaneous things I’ve done so far. I love that I am 20, and that I can still go roller-skating with friends and make the most out of it. We were totally out of our element, but once you just give up caring, you can just fool around and act like a kid again. I got a good work out and a stress relief. 

The superstar in skates.