Original story at Huck. All photography on this page by Henry Hung
…everyone seems to let everyone else do their thing – a foundational corollary to the chaos of New Orleans. A husband might move a little closer to his wife as they walk through the skating corridor, but the guys are always careful to give pedestrians a wide berth, especially children. One woman smiles and yells at the guys, “It smells like weed,” and one of the skaters yells back, “It smells you too,” which gets a big laugh. As Jarred says, “It’s pretty much One Love out here.”
That’s not to say it’s always safe. Sometimes one of the guys will grab onto a car bumper and allow himself to be dragged through the busy streets of the Central Business District. Jarred says that particular move garners different reactions; some drivers indulge the skaters, some have pulled guns on them.
The guys are nonchalant about pulling off this sort of move, but it’s a practised nonchalance. One suspects they realise how death-defying these tricks are, even if they might never admit it. There’s a moment in Gnarleans where, after watching one of the skaters get pulled through the streets, a random pedestrian says, “Coolest thing I’ve ever seen in my whole fucking life”. One of the skaters smirks and shoots back, “You got a boring ass life.”