A.B. surfers ride the charitable wave

Inspired by a video that showed how surfers from Jamaica had so few surfboards compared to surfers in other places, Atlantic Beach residents Oran Bendelstein and Mike Urra decided to collect old, used surfboards and donate them to economically disadvantaged children in Israel.

Bendelstein, 30, co-owner of clothing company, and Urra, 25, a care coordinator for adults with disabilities, realized they had many more surfboards than they needed and began collecting their older boards and some from friends. Their goal is to collect at least 40 boards. Currently they have 25. “They are extra boards, used boards that we had lying around collecting dust,” said Bendelstein, who donated several boards.

Through Zula Clothing, the Manhattan-based business owned by Bendelstein and his brother Meyer, the charity program is partnering with Israeli-based Beach House, a surf shop in the city of Natanya. “We will use the shop to distribute the boards,” said Beach House owner Eyal Rokach, who will also reach out to the community to dispense the surf- boards.

Blitz Manufacturing, an Israeli company that produces surfboards, will repair the boards.

In April, Bendelstein and Urra plan on traveling to Israel and conduct a weeklong surfing clinic for the children who received the surfboards. Plans also call for a local artist who specializes in surfboard art to paint a design chosen by the child on the board.

“We are giving back to a place we love and really connect to,” said Urra, who donated seven boards. Bendelstein, the youth director of the Jewish Center in Atlantic Beach and Urra, a member of the Atlantic Beach Rescue Squad have run a couple of surfing camps in Atlantic Beach, including one called “Little Fish” named in honor of Urra’s sister Nicole Pescepto, who died at 31 of cancer in 2008. They also ran the Joe V Surfboard camp a few years ago.

“In Israel it’s different than here, surfboards are expensive and you can’t afford one unless you are pretty well off,” Urra said. Introduced to the sport through a friend a decade ago, Bendelstein said he loved it from the beginning and hasn’t stopped surfing. Though married with two children now he continues to surf no matter the season. “I pretty much was eating, breathing and dreaming surfing and still do to this day,” said Bendelstein, who added he surfs in the summer and the winter.

Surfing since he was 4-years-old, Urra was placed on a “big, old dirty board,” 10-feet in length by his brother Dave Pescepto. “He held my hands and made me stand up,” said Urra, who was always being given his brother’s used boards.

Bringing the experience of riding the waves to children who may not otherwise do so and having people come together through surfing is Bendelstein’s main mission. “I believe that surfing is more than just riding waves and fun, it’s a way of connecting to the world, he said. “When your surfing, all the world’s problems are gone and there is no such thing as race. Your skin color doesn’t matter and religion doesn’t cause any differences between people.”