Dai's Buugeng (S-Staffs) Impressions

I'm the happy owner of one of Dai's amazing Buugeng:

Where to buy them:
https://www.zaobab.com/buugeng_about.html

Home of Poi lessons:
https://www.homeofpoi.com/lessons_all/teach/Library-Staff-S-Staff-Buugeng-4_48_0

I received the smaller version, which, with shipping to UK, came to about £60. A fantastic birthday present smile

And you get two of them with a really nice bag, so £30 each with bag isn't *so* bad. (I will note here that before buying them with my birthday money I tried to make my own out of plywood ... it was a disaster redface

)

Some people have been asking me about the quality of them, whether it's worth buying them all the way from South Africa. I'll try and give my opinion of them here. I'm not gonna say anything about spinning the damn things, as the technique thread is here:

[Old link]

First of all, the wood-working quality is excellent, they have an excellent 'heft' to them. The colour is nice and shiny too. I can't describe just how good it feels to spin something that truly feels "crafted" rather than mass-produced, injection moulded, etc. I feel like I'm spinning something with value, rather something that could just be replaced with a quick click on a fire toys website.

A note about the mechanism. From Dai's tutorial videos you can see that they unfold out from a banana-shape. In the folded position, the curves are held in place by strong magnets - they require a strong flick of the wrist to unfold, and the motion is very smooth - the pivot works great, without any creaking. The only trouble I'll mention here is that if you keep 'unfolding' the buugeng in the same direction, you'll gradually unwind the pivot (which is a thread screw with a washer that bores itself into the wood). I guess just a little care will prevent this from becoming a major concern. Even if this pivot does work itself loose, once the buugeng 'snap' into position, the magnets make sure the prop stays steady. When I drop the staff in the 'unfolded' position, the buugeng does not fold up, it stays in its proper shape. These magnets are great - but they're not so strong such that it's difficult to close.

The weighting is a lot lighter than I imagined it would be - there is not any extra weight towards the tips of the S-curves, making keeping in plane extremely difficult (or more fun to learn, depending on how you look at it!).

I hope this has been clear, if you guys want any more info I'll try my best to answer. Though do give Dai a call through his website, that would be a better way of going about it. I even got a beautiful hand-written note with my buugeng. The attention to detail he's put into this props is stunning, and they were well worth the money. I wish everyone here would go out and get some, so we can all start thinking of new tricks to do with them!

Thanks Dai hug

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