Equipment: Lightsaber Chop Sticks…You Light Up My Rice

When Ben Kenobi first showed Luke Skywalker a lightsaber he referred to it as, “an elegant weapon from a more civilized time.” I have to admit that lightsabers are pretty cool. When Star Wars first came out every kid (young and old) wanted one for their very own. I know that I did and now I have my own, sort of…I have lightsaber chop sticks!

It is not uncommon in Japan or other Asian countries to bring your own chop sticks to a restaurant. Instead of clogging up landfills bringing your own reusable chop sticks can lessen a person’s environmental impact. I like the idea of BYOCS because you can really let your individuality shine. Or in this case let your geek flag fly.

These awesome chop sticks come from Kotobukiya and though they are not perfect you do need a set. You see there must be balance in the universe and these chop sticks have both good points and bad points. The first good point is the fact that they light up. That’s right, they light up. So when you are sitting in a dimly lit restaurant people at every table can see the glow from your lightsabers. You will look like a bombastic Jedi eating your Unagi, trust me. They also come apart for easy cleaning. You don’t want to put the electronic parts in the sink (these are not dishwasher safe).

Another good point is that these are highly detailed. A bit smaller and you could use them with your 12 inch action figures and they would be great. They are the right size if you have a newborn and you want the youngling to learn the ways of the Force you can arm them.

The bad points are not really deal breakers but they do exist. The lightsabers are slightly longer (9.6 inches long) than your average chop stick. The probable reason for the extra length could be the needed room for the batteries. That leads us to the next problem with these, the weight. The batteries and the electronics do add some heft to these beauties. They are very unbalanced. This does make them harder to eat with than normal chop sticks. It could be my inexperience eating with chop sticks but my fingers got tired pretty quickly. I actually had to switch to regular ones after about 10 minutes. The same went for my friend who was using them as well. The last problem again can be attributed to my novice level of chop stick use but the lightsabers were slippery. The clear plastic chop stick part made it difficult to pick up certain pieces of sushi. Technically you should be using your hands with sushi anyway.

These officially licensed lightsaber chop sticks come in either red (Darth Vader) or blue (Luke Skywalker) and take 8 LR41 batteries. Despite the problems I had with these I really like them. You can pick these up at your local comic shop, Think Geek or from anyone that sells Kotobukiya products. The retail price is $14.95 which is a small price to pay to look like you are dining in a galaxy far, far away.