Homemade Wooden Bikes

Children in African countries usually make their own toys. As you can see from the picture, this bicycle was made by hand and is used to carry water home. Kids seldom play with toys bought from a store. For toy cars, boys construct a vehicle from wire and put bottle-caps on it for wheels. They'll steer the car with a long pole, so they can walk and push the car beside them without bending over.

Children also make balls by wading up plastic bags. They make them as small or as large as they like and secure the waded bags in place with rubberbands. They also play with old bicycle tires by keeping the tire up and rolling. The kids use sticks or their hands to push the tire along. One boy had a string tied around his tire so when he pulled the string up, it rolled the tire forward.