Toys from Prague
Every year the International Puzzle Party is held in a different country, and in 2008 the venue was Prague. Tim Rowett, our resident toy expert, was there, and - not being one to resist a bit of shopping - he bought some new toys while he was there.
The toys are a tri-sected cube - three identical pieces of plastic that slide together to make a cube; sliceforms, which are pieces of card that are slotted together, and open from flat to create amazing three dimensional shapes; matchstick cubes - an art form based on matches that slot together; a Japanese face puppet based around a clothes peg; a battery powered witch sitting on the toilet - with lots of sound effects! a lithophane - a square piece of plastic that has been made with different thicknesses of plastic - when you hold it up to the light the different thicknesses of plastic becomes different shades of light and dark, and result in a very realistic picture, in this case of Cameron Diaz; finally an amazing material from Japan - a rubbery substance that acts like a shock absorber. In this case Tim drops a raw egg onto the little square of material, and it absorbs the egg's fall so perfectly, that the egg does not break!
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