What is free is he can invest his own time and initiative to research this site and others to get gobs of info. Try to avoid alot of hand-holding. If he really wants to do this then he should research and experiment(backyard camp trying new skills). He could get plenty of stuff for a few hundred bucks and save the rest for later. I would not let him borrow my knife, I'd rather just give it to him as a way of saying "welcome to the outdoors". That way he doesn't feel bad when he breaks your knife. He feels bad that he has to buy one. Then, I would march him down to a store and get something of his own. A military-style K-BAR or something similar would be fine (inexpensive), let him figure it out. I am not a representative of K-BAR.