Thrasher Magazine

If you've been in the game long enough, you get the sense that you know all the names. But every so often a name comes across your desk that you have to stop, spellcheck, and just admire. New Mexico's Agush Agushi has one of those names. But more than that, he's got the chops to hang with Matt Berger and the Bones team. So we called up the new dude to get some backstory on him and the tales from his first big company trip. —Ted Schmitz


On the trail frequented by Hambone, the Bones crew comes through with a hot edit worthy of the region 

Captions by Agush Agushi

Let's start easy. How do you pronounce your full name?
So it’s “Uh-goosh Uh-goosh-ee."

Excellent. It's a unique name. Where does it come from?
My parents are from Kosovo.

Before this trip, I stayed at Jaws' house once. The funniest thing about it was that I slept on the couch and Jaws just played Tetris. He was locked in all night. I would wake up periodically and he’d just be playing Tetris. I was like, This dude’s the shit. He did this kickflip backside grab easy, too

Oh, sick. When did they come to the States?
I think around 1999. They came as refugees from Kosovo. There was a war going on out there. It's called Kosovo, but we're like Albanians, really. A lot of us came over to America. They kind of just spread us about the states. We happened to land in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Wow. So your family was assigned a place to live when they came over?
I don’t know the details, ‘cause I wasn’t born yet, but we had a church sponsor that helped us get on our feet and help my parents get a job. ‘Cause they didn’t speak English or anything. To this day, if you were to talk to ‘em, it's kind of hard to understand 'em, but they're getting by.

Matt Berger's what I call a super pro. Like, there's pros, and then there's the people in the league above that. Berger skated pretty much every spot on the whole trip. That's why he always got the master bedroom at the Airbnb

Cool. So they speak Albanian at home?
That's what I would say, like Albanian Shqip is the name of the language. 

So you’re bilingual?
I mostly speak English, but I picked up a little from my parents. So I could get around out there. But they could tell I’m more Americanized.

I’m from Arizona, and a lot of my neighbors were Mexican. It was really common for the kids who were born in the US to translate for their parents, like seven-year-old translators. Were you like that?
Yeah, exact same thing, except different languages.

I wasn't there for Adrian Sisk's nosemanual. So when I first met him, I thought he was a filmer, 'cause he was filming on the trip too. He also likes to walk backward in the morning to help his ankles. Seems like it's working

So you're born and raised in Albuquerque?
Yeah, I was born and raised in Albuquerque.

How do you dig it? It’s got a reputation for being kind of a crazy place.
That's a common thing to think, man. Sucks to say, because it’s a beautiful place. But there are some crazy people here. I feel like there's crazy shit happening everywhere though.

What do you think the sketchiest place is in the Southwest?
I don’t hear too much Arizona news. I don’t wanna put us on blast, but I heard there were something like 15 murders since August 17th. Actually, I was pretty bummed about this. But my neighbor about a block away, they were trying to steal his car and he went out and got shot. It was tragic. Just shit like that, you know?

This spot is such a mission, you gotta hike and you usually get stuck there all day. But that's not the only reason I hate it. After I shot this 5-0, we were all sitting on this ledge, watching the homies. We hear a car honk, 'cause it's a freeway exit. Your natural instinct is to look, so I do. And a Sprite bottle flew out their car window and hit me in the face. They threw it at us, and I was just the unlucky one. It busted my eyebrow open, so I had to leave the session to get that handled. Jake the Jeweler got me super-glued up

It’s still the wild west sometimes.
I assume that shit is probably happening in Arizona too. 

Yeah, it happened in my neighborhood too. But they were trying to take a catalytic converter.
I swear people work so hard to just steal, when you could just work hard and get a job.

You work, right?
Yeah, I do low-voltage electrical work. 

When you stay in your hometown long enough, you start to find shit that no one would think of skating. That's how this spot was in Arizona for John Motta's ollie

Nice!
I'm actually working out in Santa Fe. There's an Indian Health Hospital, so I've been out there doing their internet and their fire alarm system and all the special systems.

That’s awesome. Workin’ in the trades pays off.
I won't lie. This shit sucks, but it's better than nothing, right?

Ryan Carrell only stuck around for Arizona, but that's all he needed to get this crook nollie flip

For sure, it’s hard work. But I commend you on lockin’ down a gig young. What was your crew? Were you skating with the Rocky Norton or the Lutherans or Durans?
Rocky was like the generation before me. But yeah, the Durans. We’ve always had common affiliates. They’re more my generation of skaters. I know Mariah and Jerry and Zeke and his brother, Elijah. I skated with Elijah yesterday.

Sick. Let’s talk about this trip and the photos. I saw it was a bit of an homage to Joe Hammeke, who was a friend of mine. Did you ever meet Joe?
I unfortunately didn’t. I might have seen him a long time ago at a demo. But I wasn’t paying too much attention.

Ryan Alvero's the shit. I was the new guy, so I was kind of intimidated by meeting a bunch of new people. Ryan made me feel included. He was cool right from the jump. Just like on this ollie over to 50-50

Where was the heaviest ripping going down, Arizona or New Mexico?
I would probably say New Mexico.

Who surprised you the most or who was the MVP?
It would have to be Kristion or Santana.

Kristion skated every day on the trip. This Back Smith in ABQ was just another day for him

The young one?!
You know those kids that come around, like the Ryan Sheckler kids who are doing insane shit and they’re like four feet tall. He’s hard to keep up with.

Was this your first company skate trip?
Yeah, this was my first trip with Bones. 

How did it meet expectations? Was it a little more G-rated than you might’ve thought?
What do you mean?

We call this spot Rowley ditch because he kickflipped into it. Santana's back three looks like an old Rowley photo too

Before I went on a skate tour, I thought it was like wreckin’ hotels, doin’ cocaine and crashin’ cars.
No, it was, it was not like that at all. It was just going skating all day. They had a nice Airbnb. Most the team is pretty chill and not too heavy partiers. 

Yeah, it’s a lot of skating.
I tried to skate every day but by the fourth day my legs were dust.

The Southwest used to have a lot of action. Do you think it's time for people to start taking more trips out there again?
I think it's always a good idea to at least stop by. The Nike dudes recently stopped by and Antonio got down on some of our spots. So if you're ever passing through, you could always hit us up. We're not trying to gatekeep.

Jared hacked the knobs off the inside rail at Bullhead and Santana Smithed it quick. Santana has the ultimate finesse, man. You take him to almost any spot and he's just getting something nice on it. It was sick to be on the road with him and everyone else