Kinder Surprise
5 June 2008 - 3 סיון 5768 by Huw
In visiting Brodie, I’ve fallen in love with Kinder Surprise: these toys available in Canada - but not in the USA. I think the problem is they’re nothing but small parts. And, of course, they are hidden in chocolate eggs. In homage to what, I’m sure, is a fear of choking children, I usually but the entire egg in my mouth, let the chocolate melt and then spit out the plastic capsule that contains the tiny parts to the tiny toys.
I usually buy one or two any time we go to a corner shop. They cost about $1.50 US. Each toy is a very cute little puzzle of sorts: assemble them yourself following our easy-to-follow no-words instruction books. It’s like that. There are many pictures of Kinder toys on flickr, but because of lighting and lack of a tripod, I’m not getting good pictures of my collection.
Instead, I played with a kaleidoscope that I got out of one Kinder Egg - and I made these shots playing with the tiny kaleidoscope and various things around my room (you can click on ‘em for bigs):
Oh man, you just tapped a thick vein of childhood nostalgia. Those Kinder Surprises are a German thing, and this little German deli/venison processing center out in the middle of nowhere near where I grew up sold them (as well as piles and piles of other ass-kicking European candies). The toys in those things back when I was seven or so…they had these little faithful reproductions of classic cars that you had to put together and then could rev up and let go. I think I still have some Kinder Surprise toys in my childhood room. When I moved to Israel, they sold them in most places, so I got a couple out of nostalgia but was disappointed to discover the toys weren’t nearly as cool anymore. With no real evidence, I’m going to blame the EU.