D is for DUNG CAKES
I have been fascinated by these little fuel disks since the moment I set foot on Indian soil. The efficiency with which they are collected excites the recycler in me. The huge range of uses makes me curious: besides being used as a fuel and fertilizer, they are also used to plaster rural home walls and as insect repellents.
My husband told me that when we was small, they would brush their teeth with the ash left over in the stove after buring cow dung. Put some on their finger and brush. It has an abrasive quality and is said to also be antiseptic.
The beautiful patterns...a collage of hand pat prints on each round cake as rows and neat little rows are smacked up onto walls, fences, trees – any place where the sun will shine and dry them out ...evokes a feeling comparable to what I get when I look at Warhol's soup cans.
Recently, I've even heard that one group is "fortifying" the cakes, packaging them and selling them as safer fuel that isn't harmful to the environment.
My husband told me that when we was small, they would brush their teeth with the ash left over in the stove after buring cow dung. Put some on their finger and brush. It has an abrasive quality and is said to also be antiseptic.
The beautiful patterns...a collage of hand pat prints on each round cake as rows and neat little rows are smacked up onto walls, fences, trees – any place where the sun will shine and dry them out ...evokes a feeling comparable to what I get when I look at Warhol's soup cans.
Recently, I've even heard that one group is "fortifying" the cakes, packaging them and selling them as safer fuel that isn't harmful to the environment.
posted by tik-tiki at
1:01 AM
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