My name is Kaiser Auberlen and I am a 12-year-old surfer from the North Shore of Oahu. I have been surfing for seven years now and have been lucky enough to travel all over the world looking for waves. Most recently, I just took an amazing trip to Lakey Peak, Sumbawa, where my dad and I visited my Indo uncle Oney Anwar. It was an amazing trip and I love how surfing takes you to great places where you can meet cool people and get good waves.
Uncle Oney is one of the top Indonesian surfers who always stays with us when he comes to Hawaii. He’s been asking us to come visit him in Sumbawa for years, so finally, we did. Three plane flights and a two-hour drive later, we were there.
On my first day, I woke up to a pumping Lakey Peak. It’s a sick wave–a perfect peak with a long left and two barreling sections at low tide. The right is kind of like an easier version of Backdoor, if there even is such a thing. At high tide, it becomes an incredible performance wave, like Trestles on steroids. We surfed our brains out that first morning, came in and had breakfast at Fatmahs, then went and surfed Periscopes in the afternoon. This became our routine for the next two weeks.
That same day I also got to meet a lot of the local kids. Waduha, Eka, Fajuri, Rasa, Rama, Rafi became good friends on our trip, surfing and hanging out at Nungas a lot. They were so nice to me and really welcomed me into their group. We played with tops they made out of wood themselves and they even taught me how to speak some Indonesian. I brought a football and taught them how to play. It’s just really cool to know that you can go anywhere in the world and meet nice people. I will never forget them.
As for the rest of Lakey Peak, it’s an awesome setup, kind of like a mini North Shore. You have Lakey Peak in the middle, right in front of the Aman Gati Hotel. About 200 yards to the left is Lakey Pipe, a thick, grinding left barrel. To the right is Nungas, a long freight training left–each of them world-class lefts (glad I’m a goofy foot). Cobblestones and Periscopes are outside of the Lakey village, places that are as fun getting to as they are to surf. To get there, you need to take some gnarly scooter rides on bumpy roads with lots of mud.
During our two week trip, we got some awesome waves. A couple of days at Lakey Peak were solid overhead with perfect barrels, and the waves honestly never dropped under about four feet during our trip. My dad and I even scored Lakey Pipe with just one other friend three different times, trading off perfect barrels. And like I said, I surfed Nungas a few times with my new Indonesian friends as well. To say we scored good waves on this trip would be an understatement.
But not only did we find great waves, I got to enjoy them with great friends. The unreal sessions in the water came with some amazing experiences on land as well. One of the coolest things of the entire trip was the day all my new friends gave me the tops that they made by hand so I could bring them back to Hawaii and play with my friends at home. The kids here don’t have much. There aren’t toy stores, so for them to give me something they’d made themselves was very special and I’ll never forget it. It’s also a great takeaway that goes with the very thing my dad has been teaching me on some of our trips around the world. He says we can’t go to these places and just take, take, take, whether it’s waves or anything else. The lesson is simple: you need to give back. So on this trip he and I brought school supplies for some of the local kids, like crayons, markers, pens, pencils, and goody bags from my sponsors Rip Curl, Vans, and Sun Bum. The kids were so stoked and I loved the experience of giving them something as well. It makes you feel good inside. So I’ve learned that it doesn’t matter what you give, just do something for somebody else.
I had a fantastic trip, got to surf unbelievable waves, made great new friends, and learned a lot along the way. Traveling is a great way to learn about other people and learn something about yourself too. I think if we all were a little more friendly, help others whenever we can, and make more of an effort to take care of our planet, we would all be way better off. And if you can get sick barrels along the way, even better.
Note: All photos taken by Thiago Okazuka and Grommet Ahmad. You can follow more of North Shore micro grom Kaiser’s adventures around the world on Instagram here.
