Kilimanjaro Lion Conservation Project

Category: General | Date: Jun 11 2008 | By: Seamus

A few days ago I mentioned the links on the sidebar of this blog. One of my favourites is afrigadget. As a tribute I’ve put together a few pics of a tool that the builders in camp are using at the moment.

I think its name in english is “adze“. Its a curved, bladed tool for chipping wood or cutting rope / papyrus. The builders are from Mombasa and they use it to make footholds in coconut trees, to climb to the top.

You can click here to buy one, for oh, maybe 150 pounds (thats the money people use in England by the way. England is an island. to get there you go all the way to New York, and then carry on going…)

Or… you can find someone with a sturdy vehicle, and redistribute one element of the spring pack (note: here in africa we like euphemisms). For a landcruiser like this one, you’ll need probably 12, 16 and 18mm spanners, a bit of time, and a moerse hammer.

Next, find a large truck.

You can either buy, borrow or nationalise one of the wheel nuts, depending on your fiscal relationship with the truck’s owner.

A man with a welding machine will, for a small fee, trim and join these pieces together. If he doesn’t get it right the first time then get him to try again. Don’t worry too much about how it looks… form follows function and all that. Cut a branch from the nearest tree, to use for the shaft…

sharpen the end to a deadly edge…

You can use the back of the adze to knock nails into wood, or to make more adzes. Or simply to impress your friends. If you tried really hard you could probably even slice and dice vegetables. If you’re as enthusiastically clumsy and accident-prone as me you will probably hurt yourself in the process.

signing out from southern Maasailand,

Seamus

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