Guled Adan Abdi Making mechanized toys from scraps

Guled Adan Abdi was 13 in 2016 when his toymaking abilities made the international limelight, but he had been making toys for some time before then. Somalia has been ravaged by conflicts since the 1990s and most of its citizens have been affected in some way. Abdi’s father went missing years ago and he is cared for by his mother who was also injured by a bullet that shattered her shoulder. Abdi’s mother sells pancakes and sometimes cannot afford to care for her family alone, needing to leave them with relatives from time to time. In addition to the emotional and psychological effects of the constant instability in his life, Abdi is not able to always attend school. At 13, he was still in the third year of primary school with eight-year-olds.

Despite these challenges however, Abdi found time to observe the working of cars around him and was fascinated by the engineering involved. He thought he could try his hand at producing a miniature car and began to gather scrap metals and other materials. Encouraged by his teacher, who bought him his first set of batteries, Abdi would soon produce beautiful moving toy cars and airplanes, and his fame began to spread through the community, culminating with a feature on the BBC. Abdi was invited to the statehouse where the leader of his region Puntland, Abdiweli Mohammed Ali, presented him with a scholarship, thus ensuring future uninterrupted education. Abdi hopes to study engineering science and make automobiles in the future.