Shopping for jewels
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Shopping for Jewels,
Cambodian-Style
Outfoxing the
gem scammers
By Susan Miles |
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A gem stone miner sorts
through the slush pit in
Chum Rom Bei Srak, Cambodia.
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The kick off point for
most international visitors to Cambodia is the neighboring country of Thailand.
Here in the capital of Bangkok, tourists make the most of the discounted travel
gear, clothing and variety of tour providers to organize their adventure into
this ancient and fascinating land.
While it's possible to
find good deals, one can't help but notice the
warnings posted in guidebooks and brochures, advising them to be weary of the
“gemstone scam.” (See
Crossing the Street in Bangkok in this month's
Special Section on Southeast Asia.)
Unsuspecting tourists who
are herded into jewelry stores by pushy tuk
tuk taxi drivers are sold so-called bargain stones. They are then persuaded to avoid the “import duties” by having them conveniently mailed to
their home countries. If they turn up at all, the stones usually turn out to be
well short of the value quoted.
No one likes to be taken
for a sucker, but there is a way to avoid these unscrupulous middlemen by going
directly to the source.
In the red, dust-coated
province of Ratanakiri, in the northeast of Cambodia, the locals are hard at
work cultivating a range of produce, from cashews to bananas, sugar cane to
glorious blue onyx gemstones. From the main township of Ratanakiri, it's a short 18
mile (30 km) two-hour drive over roads so rough they are nicknamed “dancing
roads" to the mining town of Chum Rom Bei Srak.
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The uncut stones |
Here, we found sorters
busy at work shifting through freshly-mined stones.
As they expertly work their
way through the pile, stopping occasionally to trim the stones with wire
cutters, they check for cracks and flows that will determine whether the stone
ends up a precious five carat jewel or less expensive one to two carat stones.
This town with its modest,
wood slab stores and stilt homes is no more than a cluster of buildings along
the main road at the entrance to the mine. In contrast to the rest of Cambodia,
it has a barely lived in feel, which is hardly surprising, as the mine was only
discovered four years earlier.
No fancy equipment or
structures are in sight, just a rough field of simple, square holes with foot
holds cut into the inside of the mine. Some are more elaborate, connected by
shafts, but most look no more sophisticated than an oversized rabbit hole.
The miners work in teams
of close friends and immediate family. Implicit trust and honesty are required
to work the mines successfully, as a good stone could be the equivalent of a
month’s salary in this heavily impoverished country.
The work is hard, with
only simple tools at hand, a bucket and a hand turned wrench to dig out the
minimum eight feet (2.4 m) deep mines. The stones don’t show themselves until at
least this depth below the surface.
The day we visited,
Chinese New Year celebrations saw most of the miners enjoying rice wine parties
rather than working their mines. However, Mr. Yuen, a 24-year-old, four-year
veteran of gemstone mining, was hard at work with his cane-woven sieve in a
water-filled slush pit. He paused long enough to show us some of his earlier
finds. In our hands, they were rather uninteresting looking cola-colored
pebbles.
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The raw stones are cut
to reveal gems. |
While we took in the hard
labor and patience it took to extract these stones, our ex-commodities trader
tour guide could not help himself, and out of old habits, he started negotiating
a price. When we realized that in town we could have these expertly cut to
reveal the blue jewels, the US$5 price tag for three stones was a worthwhile
investment to see the end result.
Upon our return to the
township of Ratanakiri, we dropped by one of the three gemstone stores. These
simple, tiny rooms open directly onto the street without even a wall, door or
window: Tiffany’s they are not!
Instead, just a
glass-cased counter in front displays the cut stones with a workbench behind.
The lack of furnishings allowed us to view the skilled cutter at his craft,
working the rotating wheel in the style of a potter’s wheel to turn the brown
stones to blue gems.
Our chosen cutter took
some convincing to take on our three-stone commission. Normally dealing in lots
of 50-100 stones at a time, he couldn’t work out why we crazy tourists would pay
more to have our stones cut than what we would spend to get ones already
processed.
But with some fast-talking
by our local guide named “Lucky,” our request was met, with a deal struck at a
US$ 1 a carat.
Because the heating and
cutting process takes two hours and it was near day’s end, we were going to have
to wait until the next day to see the finished product.
But the following day, our
freshly cut, freshly polished “babies” arrived. Like any new parents, we fussed
over and photographed our new arrivals at every angle. Our “eldest,” biggest
stone came in at a whopping four-carat, our middle two-carat, and the runt of
the litter, the one we were told would turn to dust under the cutters tools, a
respectable one-carat. Total investment, including cutting -- US$ 12!
Had we beat the scammers
and made a good investment? Who cared? For 12 bucks we got to take the journey
from mine, to gem cutter, to finished stone. It was an added bonus when a
visiting geologist, on the hunt for Asian Rubies and Sapphires, declared our
modest investment for our three blue Ratanakiri Onyxes gemstones a savvy buy,
worth at least US$ 100! Definitely the most satisfying jewelry shopping I’ve
ever done!!
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A traveler shows off
the gems she purchased. |
IF YOU GO
Should your visit to
Cambodia not provide you with the time or opportunity to buy your blue Onyxes
gemstones direct from the mines, no need to panic. These can be readily bought
either loose or set in jewelry for between US$ 20-50, depending upon the carat
and quality.
While you won’t find
rubies, diamonds or sapphires on offer, I wouldn’t trade my gemstones from the
Chum Rom Bei Srak mine for all the Tiffany filled display cases!
GETTING THERE
The township of Ratanakiri
is a one-hour flight from the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh. Accommodation at
the Yaklom Hill Lodge (15 minutes by car from town) ranges from US$ 8 for
singles to US$ 18 for a family cottage. Email:
yaklom@camiatel.com website:
www.yaklom.com.
From the Lodge, visitors
can conveniently arrange 4WD hire with driver for US$ 35-40 per day, and an
English-speaking tour guide for US$ 15 a day to visit the Chum Rom Bei Srak town
and mine.