About 10 years ago I sat next to this guy on a plane ride and towards the end of the flight he opened up his backpack and showed me all of these yo-yos. It was so strange, seeing all these different yo-yos and having no idea what to think. I know I was completely unimpressed. At the time I was into skateboarding and beer. I think he wanted to me to marvel at his collection. How dorky, I thought. What a goof. I just had no frame of reference and didn’t really bother to inquire further. Skip ahead to 2 months ago when on a whim I bought a 3 dollar Duncan butterfly from Walmart. I thought it added a nice effect to my halloween costume. Like a gag prop. For whatever reason I will never understand I started to obsess about this toy. Namely, why the heck isn’t this thing sleeping. So I googled “how to get a yoyo to sleep”. About a day later I ordered a responsive yoyo. I became fixated on this object. Never did I realize the depth of intricacy that can be achieved with this simple toy. I think I am fascinated because the act of yo-yoing and learning new tricks seems to calm me, balancing my emotions and at the same time feeding a desire to learn a 3 dimensional skill. It’s meditative and puts me in the moment. I like not knowing how to do all the tricks and that I have years ahead of me to enjoy learning them and getting stoked. I can’t say that this kid on the plane encouraged me in any way, or was the motivation, but I still remember it crystal clear. Thanks dude on the plane. And thanks 3 dollar Duncan from Walmart. Tell me your story.
Nice story there. Looks like for you it went from not interesting to very interesting. For me it started six years ago. I was home bored looking up random music and soccer videos on Youtube. As I looked at more and more videos, one showed up in the recommended for you section titled “Yo-yo God” featuring Hiroyuki Suzuki at the 2005 World yoyo contest. I clicked on the video and was amazed at the skills and speed of this spectacular player. After watching it a few times, I wanted to try out a yo-yo. A few days later I bought a yo-yo from 7Eleven and after learning the sleeper wanted to learn more tricks. When I looked up trick tutorials I came across the ones that really got me hooked into this hobby. The beginner tutorials by the legendary Andre Boulay were the first tricks I learned. In about a year and a half I learned all beginner, all intermediate, and most of the advanced tricks from tutorials by Andre Boulay. It was until I took my yo-yo to school that I knew I was good at doing something I love. I took it and was playing while looking away from the classroom and as soon as I turned the entire class and the teacher clapped for me, it really was a great self-esteem booster as well as a indicator that I was good at something. For me, I personally like the feeling of successfully completing a trick, it really is satisfying to me. The same feeling of fun I had six years ago while playing, I still have today. It is also a great stress reliever for me and also puts me at ease when I feel overwhelmed by everyday things. I really hope to continue this for a long time. I currently have about 30 yo-yo’s and still practice everyday, whether it is 1a, 2a, 3a, 4a, or 5a. I truly thank Hiroyuki Suzuki for his flawless performance that made me take up this amazing sport. I would also like to thank Andre Boulay for putting up great tutorials that I learned from as well as running this amazing website where I can communicate with other fellow players and learn more.
I watched Shinji then be like, ‘cool’, then I started yoyoing.
A few years ago, while shopping for Christmas presents, I saw a Duncan Butterfly in the blister pack hanging on display at the checkout line. I remembered being a youngster and enjoying yoyo, remembered watching Tom Baker in Doctor Who (he happened to be quite nifty with a yoyo), and remembered always wanting a Butterfly, but, only having an Imperial. So, I purchased it. I wanted to show tricks to my kids (mistakenly thought they would think I was cool), took a trick book out from the library & mastered sleeper, rock the baby and William Tell. Kids were unimpressed. However, my son picked up on the tricks really quickly. We went online to find new tricks and…WOW! Yoyos had bearings, and some, you needed to do a trick just to make it come back to your hand. Son and I were hooked. We purchased a couple of Popstars (the original one, not the new version) because we didn’t know better (meaning we didn’t really think about the specs, and the price was right). Learned a bunch from the videos here and elsewhere. Most importantly, discovered A2Z Science and Learning through the ‘real life stores’ thread in BST. Met some incredible people and began to realize that the world of yoyos isn’t just about the toy, but how it brings together all sorts of people, encourages creativity and sharing, and welcomes anyone who likes playing yoyo.
awesome
Thanks for sharing. 
It all started last summer with a low quality auto return yo-yo given in given gift bags. As a started throwing it I realized it was sort of therapeutic, this feeling quickly went away since the yo-yo’s internal mechanism had broken after half an hour. After it broke someone else gave me theirs but it broke just the same. I had remembered from when I was young my uncle used to talk about Duncan, so I bought a cheap Butterfly at a local supermarket. It worked well enough then I looked up the website that was on its packaging; the website was old and dated I thought yo-yoing was dying out. Then I found a Butterfly XT through another supermarket… wow a whole new world with a ball bearing. Soon after I started looking up tutorial videos which caused me to stumble upon YoYoExpert’s site. I did not know there were different styles of play and so many companies out there! Fast forward to now, I own a nice collection of different brands and just figured out the Kwijibo on Andre’s Tutorials. It’s my relaxing hobby since I took a break from the expensive hobby of modifying and working on my car. I don’t think I would have been as interested if I hadn’t found this community so thank you!
-bbdave-
1988 my Grandpa gave my cousin and I each a Smothers Brothers yoyo (can’t believe these were $3 new! What a steal). He also had recorded a number of Smothers Brothers shows to show us them playing with yoyos and the tricks. Whenever we stayed with my Grandparents they tried to teach us things, and have fun. Trips to museums, working in Grandpa’s shop, watching documentaries, etc. I guess my Grandpa enjoyed yoyos when he was younger, and thought his grandsons should know about them. So we sat that weekend super excited to learn tricks, and were amazed watching the Smothers perform on their show. I still own that yoyo, and played with it for years.
Fast forward to the yoyo boom in the mid 90’s I got a Spintastics Tornado, and a ProYo II. The ProYo I bought because ProYo was coming to town and the contest they were holding you had to use a fixed axle, and that was the recommended yoyo. Saved up that year and bought a Turbo Bumble Bee, which I loved and still use to this day. Was amazed and the things you could do with them. At that time I was pretty much only interested in learning picture tricks. Then started watching the Sector Y videos from '99-01. Then got real heavy into inline skating and playing guitar and put my yoyo’s down for the most part.
Fast forward to 2013 I wanted to see if people were still playing with yoyo’s and did a search online and found a video of Hiroyuki Suzuki and my jaw hit the ground. Did some more searching and found YYE.
I don’t know if I’ve been “fascinated” by yoyo’s. They’ve almost always been around, and I enjoy learning and playing. I especially like playing responsive, seeing how far I can push that, I like the challenge.
I think it’s amazing there is a yoyo school ! Does Andre teach there ? I see it’s in Massachusetts. I want to take lessons !!
Good story. I can totally relate. All the tutorial videos certainly keep me going too. I’d have no idea how to learn otherwise.
Thanks for sharing. Each story is unique and original. I could do a short movie about this stuff.
Andre sometimes does teach at yoyo school. I have a video of him teaching my 10 year old daughter Brain Twister. Yoyo school is great, there are so many talented yoyo players in western MA, it is almost surreal seeing people like Andre or Eric Koloski teaching kids gravity pull (in case you were wondering, both of them are really good at gravity pull). Everyone is welcome at yoyo school, no one cares if you are throwing the latest unobtanium masterpiecs or the most basic yoyo, everyone is there to share their knowledge and welcome you to the community.
If you ever get to a contest where YoYo Expert has a booth, make sure you go and introduce yourself. Andre and his team are some of the nicest, most humble and welcoming people I’ve ever met.
The first time I took an interest in yoyos was 9 yrs ago when this group called “NED” came to my elementary school and did this show with yoyos along with a nice message for kids. After that the school was selling those “NED” yoyos and the whole school had one except me, my parents thought it was a waste of money (they should see me now).
Fast forward a couple months I bought this triple action yoyo in the mall with my birthday money and it was a great yoyo but I didn’t really get to learn any tricks therefore I forgot about the yoyo in a couple of weeks.
Now when i became a senior in highschool the whole kendama craze started going around about 2 years ago now and everyone at school had a kendama, i thought I didn’t really want to be like the rest so I remembered my old yoyo and decided to find it through my old stuff. I found it but it was pretty much broken, so I googled yoyos and came up with yoyotricks on YouTube and from there I bought my first ball bearing yoyo, the sage. From yoyotricks I started to learn all their basic tricks on YouTube and picked up on it pretty fast then I bought my first unresponsive yoyo from yoyoexpert. from there I became obsessed over it for a while, you know that stage everyone goes through where one must have all the yoyos they can possibly have. I later realized one just needs one good yoyo to enjoy the hobby but one or two more never hurt someone.
Long story short I was at toys r us with my parents and saw a bright red yoyo and asked my parents to buy it for me because I really wanted to see how many times I could make it go up and down :
Originally got into it in the 90s like every other 12 year old, lol. Picked it up again a few years ago after getting off drugs and booze. Needed something to focus on and fill all the free time i had at the time. Dont really want to get into it any deeper on here. But it was good for me at the time. And i still throw every day.
I was bamabino (eighties) I used to play with classic wooden yoyo … then I stopped. In 2009, an evening like many others, I was in the office and there suddenly came the desire to buy a yoyo, because for decades not seen one, they first came out and I went to buy a wooden yoyo (€ 2.5! ;D) in a toy store, and until that moment I did not know how totally this toy and the way of using it were so deeply changed.
Since I am curious by nature, a few hours later I started to search the internet and … I opened up a new world that still fascinates me today !!!
Got one for Easter and wonder what else can you do with a yoyo,week later got a good throw but wasn’t enough so looked online and got a fast201 then I got obsessed and now I have 52 yoyo’ a so this April will be 1 year of Yoyoing.
I had a friend in middle school who had a Yomega Fireball. I had to get one of those (because middle school) then, around Christmas, there was a guy throwing B.C. Yoyos at a mall kiosk. I was fascinated by what he was doing, begged my dad to get me one.
I threw those B.C. wooden throws and random Duncan Imperials and Butterflies for 20 years. Wore out the B.C.s and when I went online to look for more, found out what yo-yo is today. Here I am.
You must be pretty good with a wooden fixed axel then! 
I can remember seeing the yomegas in the 90s and being totally drawn to them. I thought they looked so cool, I just loved the look of the translucent plastic bodies. No doubt why I still love the look today. We didn’t have any money back then, so I would ride my bike to gas stations around the house and dig through the vacuum cleaners at the car washes and scrounge up all the change that people sucked up off their floorboards (a method of obtaining cash that I would later use quite regularly). Eventually I had enough change to pick up a Brain, and man did I wear that thing out. Just throwing sleepers, seeing how long I could make it sleep and excitedly wait for it to return. Eventually my dad asked me if I could do walk the dog, rock the baby, etc and that got me into trying tricks, which at the time I didn’t even know you could do with a yoyo. That was the beginning for me. A little later, freshman year in high school, we had the opportunity to use a yoyo for a physics project, and I picked up a cherry bomb. I remember thinking that thing was an engineering marvel with its bearing lol.