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I stumbled upon a website www.more-than-tools.de for a company called DICK based in Germany. It sells all manner of Japanese (and other) craft and gardening tools, tamahagane kitchen knives, lathes, even beautiful pieces of exotic timber, pure camellia oil (the oil of choice for metal edged weapons, especially katana), traditional wood treatments, chisels in Damascus steel, ray skin, paua shell... Its a real Aladdin's cave of mouth-wateringly lovely things. They are very reasonably priced and ship quickly and cheaply. I've just taken delivery of my camellia oil, a tough Japanese sickle (kama) for sorting out the 'eco-area' at the end of the garden and a Japanese planting hoe and they are lovely pieces of equipment. Please have a look and enjoy. The catalogue makes the best toilet reading ever, too.

The only problem is everything is delivered in a box with the word 'DICK' in large letters on the sides. My neighbour handed me the parcel the posty left with her this morning with a wink and huge grin on her face. I was so embarrassed I actually opened it in front of her to show her it was a sickle and not an 'enlargement' device.