Scraping and sanding down bamboo

I thought I could chuck a piece of bamboo dowel into an electric screw driver and sand it down by spinning the dowel between sandpaper block. 
The idea is so simple that it must work. Then putting theory to practice, I observed:
1. 80 or 100 grit removes matrrial quickly. 80 permagrit is too coarse and the surface is rough. 240 is very fine but takes very long.
2. If the sandpaper are of different grit, the spinning dowel will try to run up the coarse sandpaper.
3. Pressure needs to be applied, foam backed sandpaper is too soft for 1.8mm dowel.
4. Electric screwdriver spins too slow, dremel spins too fast.

Paring with a NT cutter removes fine curls of bamboo. I held the dowel on a cutting mat and rolled it as I scrape away. I observed that if the dowel was scraped to lop sided, by rolling the dowel, I can feel where the flat spots are when rolling it on the mat. I would then roll perhaps 90 degrees to either side and scrape again. Finally, I would replace the scraping motion with 100 grit and then 240 grit sandpaper block.