You get what you pay for-more ice lollies

A few posts back I wrote about the Hanayama ice lollies.  Nifty puzzles they are. Even though they are easy to solve, I did enjoy playing with them.  I think I wrote that I got these summer of 2010 in Japan.  Well, in January of 2011 I was in the China floor of the HK toys and games fair and saw a couple of these in a distributors booth.  He wouldn't sell them to me, so I hunted my favorite haunts until I found them.

So here they are and remember, you get what you pay for!  (These were HK$14 each)

I wish I could show you the packaging, but if I do, you'll know where to look for these. Suffice it to say they are copies. Although slightly changed, they are still copies. You will notice in that photo that I have changed the covers around. It's because the Vanilla (who ever heard of GREEN vanilla-pistachio maybe, but not vanilla), Strawberry and Blueberry puzzles are all identical. Seriously. The only difference is in the packaging! Ok, we won't count the rounding of the edges, nor the less than perfect fit of the covers, nor the fact that the puzzle pieces can go in in any direction unlike the original.  Hmmm on second thought, maybe they aren't copies.  Maybe they are original designs.  But then if they are, they are poorly done original designs....

You still don't believe me? Well then take a look at the inside....

My overall verdict on these?  A waste of money if you find them at the online sellers and pay the price they are asking....They take all of 2 minutes to take apart and solve as there are only 8 pieces to them and those are mirror images.  I also wouldn't purchase these for children.  The company that makes them....not exactly known for quality assurance.

As for me, I'm off to eat a real ice lolly because yet again the temperature is over 30c and the humidity is still hovering around 90%......