ABU DHABI // Take two solid plastic balls, tie them on a string with a plastic handle in the middle, and there you have it – a clacker.
You also have a children’s fad that comes along regularly in between the reigns of the yo-yo and the hula hoop, but with a much more irritating noise and, health experts say, greater threat of injury.
UAE streets have lately been ringing with the “clack-clack-clack” of Pro-Clackers, which are available from most Baqala corner shops.
“All the schoolchildren buy one,” said Mohammed Kunhu, who runs the Golden Night Baqala Supermarket near Al Nahda National School.
Mr Kunhu said clacker popularity picked up about a month ago when he was selling about 50 a week. Now he sells one or two every day.
“They like this,” he said. “They are happy.”
The toy is similar to bolas, a South American weapon. You hold it by the handle and move your wrist up and down until the balls bounce off each other above and below, making the loud, clacking sound.
Rasheed Mulakkal, manager of the Baqala Al Idaah just down the street from Mr Kunhu’s shop, sold Pro-Clackers three months ago – but never again.
“It’s very, very crazy. That is why I stopped selling,” Mr Mulakkal said, admitting he sold out of the toy quickly but the headache it caused was not worth the revenue.
Health experts point to a long list of children’s injuries, and another list of countries that have banned clackers.
Their packaging says the toy is not suitable for children under the age of 3 because the small parts are a choking hazard. There have also been cases of the balls shattering, sending plastic shards flying.
But Dr Eeva-Liisa Langille, a paediatrician at Burjeel Hospital in Abu Dhabi, says the clackers’ risks go even further.
“If you think about children doing some sort of movement where a ball swings on the end of the string, it can swing to 360° in one direction and that would fit perfectly with somebody’s eye socket and cause serious injury there,” she said.
“You can imagine that they will be a sort of toy that could hurt somebody else, not just the one who is using it. I mean, it’s based on a hunting weapon.”
The risks were no deterrent to a group of boys spinning their clackers in an Abu Dhabi park, oblivious to the piercing racket they were creating.
“It’s very good, it’s a good game,” said Ibrahim Arikat, 11, from Jordan. “It’s easy for boys big and small. It’s easy-easy.”
Ibrahim pointed to the bruises on his right forearm as though they were badges of honour.
But he insisted: “It’s no problem, no problem.”
Clackers come in a variety of colours. The ones that light up cost Dh10, while regular ones go for Dh7. A smaller version of the toy goes for Dh4.
The Posters shop in the Tourist Club Area sells smaller clackers as party favours. A bag of 12 costs Dh10.
“It’s funny how these playground trends come back around,” said Emma Cartwright, who helps to run Posters, a family business.
“I remember when I was about 7, I had the most wonderfully annoying clacker that I just thought was the coolest thing.
“The reason I think it’s probably popular is it’s accessible to everybody, it’s cheap and it’s something that you don’t really have to have a huge skill to do.”
Clackers were big in the 1960s, but by the 1980s they were banned by many countries.
It has made many unenviable online lists such as the Top 10 Banned Toys and the 5 What Were They Thinking Toys.
But it is also one of the 32 Most Popular Toys From the Last 145 Years, says Wired magazine.
