Pumpkins For Helmets In Nigeria And XMas Trees For Teeth

IT is now law in Nigeria to wear a helmet when riding a motorcycle. And the helmet of choice is made from pumpkin [calabash].

Right now hundreds of Nigerians are doing impressions of the Headless Horsemen, each with hollowed out pumpkin atop their heads.

Kano Federal Road Safety Commission commander Yusuf Garba is not happy:

“We are impounding their bikes and want to take them to court so they can explain why they think wearing a calabash is good enough for their safety.”

And it not just the look and the cost of a real helmet that keeps the pumpkins in fashion:

Stories have also appeared in the local papers highlighting passengers’ fears that the helmets could be used by motorcyclists to cast spells on their clients, making it easy for them to be robbed.

“Some people can put juju inside the helmets and when they are worn the victim can either lose consciousness or be struck dumb,” passenger Kolawole Aremu told the Daily Trust newspaper.

Pumpkins seem to be the ideal answer. Good that a country has come up with use for the vegetable that is wantonly discarded after the brief frenzy of Halloween.

Anorak hereby invited readers to send hollowed out pumpkins to our usual address as part of our Pumpkins For Africa campaign. We only ask that the  pumpkins are cleaned and that the tea lights within extinguished.

Also send in your old Christmas trees, which are being used in some of the more remote parts of Chad as toothpicks – the way to better oral hygiene…

Anorak

Posted: 7th, January 2009 | In: Photojournalism, Strange But True Comment | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink