Namotu is the ultimate playground. Photo: joliphotos.com
So much of surfing revolves around community: the faces you see in the lineup day after day, the surfers you nod to in the gym or at local bars, the screaming groms and families hanging out at the beach on the weekends. In surfing, there’s also a lot of talk about attitude in the water, but usually, there’s no tangible prize for smiling on slow days or chatting up other surfers during lulls.
However, one 501c(3) non-profit, the International Surf Therapy Organization, just put its money where its mouth is to reward one surfer with a positive attitude with their Aloha Award. The winner of the award receives a one-week, all-expenses paid trip to Fiji’s premier watersports resort, Namotu Island, as well as a donation of $12,000 to a charity or charitable endeavor of their choice.
The top five nominated surfers also receive awards. Besides the first-place winner, the runner-up receives a one-week, all-expenses-paid trip to Namotu Island and a donation of $6,000 to a charity of their choice. The three remaining finalists also receive a donation of $3,000 to a charity of their choice. Besides the donations, all of the top five finalists receive a $2,500 stipend to either attend the International Surf Therapy Organization (ISTO) conference or pay for education-related expenses dedicated to developing the capacity to scale their organizations. Lastly, the winner, runner-up and remaining finalists all receive personalized trophies.
These trips to Namotu Island for the winner and runner-up take place in April of next year, so this year’s Aloha Award winners will go to Namotu in April, 2026. The award accepts nominations from the general public between January 1 and March 31 of each year, so the clock is ticking for everyone to nominate surfers.
While the organization details that “there are no strict eligibility criteria for the Aloha Award other than a demonstrated commitment to living a life consistent with the principles of the Aloha Spirit,” the Aloha Spirit is defined as embodying kindness, unity, agreeability, humility, and patience. The Aloha Spirit can manifest in acts big or small, from sharing a smile to saving another human being’s life.
The organization also wrote that “most successful nominees have a demonstrated commitment to spreading joy and stoke in the lineup and a track record of social or environmental activism, typically (but not exclusively) in the surf therapy or ocean conservation arenas.” Lastly, their website does provide some intel with a list of past winners.
The five most recent Aloha Award winners are Babacar Thiaw, the founder and president of the Senegalese Surfrider chapter as well as the creator of Copacabana Surf Village, Senegal’s first zero-waste restaurant. Thiaw has worked to raise awareness about pollution in Senegal, organized beach cleanups, and paved the way for countless more zero-waste restaurants in the area.
In 2023, Ben Brondsema was given the Aloha Award for his work founding Surfivor, a Netherlands-based surf therapy program for veterans and first-responders with PTSD. Based on the psychology of flow and “the Blue Mind,” Surfivor aims to contribute to trust in recovery through surfing.
In 2022, the winner was Mike Castro, who founded the surf therapy program Olas y Sonrisas to help youth and those with disabilities cultivate a positive mindset, respect, empathy, and an appreciation for the environment.
In 2021, Chris Dennis was awarded the Aloha Award for both partnering with the Positive Vibe Warriors Foundation to do a surfboard drive for the youth of Trinidad and Tobago and for co-founding Waves for Hope, a non-profit designed to offer youth and community development programs in Trinidad.
Nigel Savel took the win in 2020 for starting the 9Miles Project alongside his wife Sher’Neil. The project aims to empower at-risk youth in South Africa by providing access to surfing, supplementary education, literacy classes, and life skills and leadership training, among other things.
While surfing is technically the common denominator, the even bigger link is the motivation to improve communities through programs and actions that have grown stronger with time. Maybe it’s cliché, but if so, it’s cliché for a reason: these surfers prove that we all have the power to make a difference. Those little actions add up. And this year, your activism could be rewarded with a trip to Namotu Island.
