Travelling the world to find the best pearls in the world sounds like a dream of a job. And it is, most of the time. It is a job which has taken me to countries and places I never thought I would see. I think the exemplar of this is getting VERY excited to see paddy fields the first time I was in mainland China. The native chinese I was with understandably thought I was insane. Paddy fields are normal to them. But to me they were school geography lessons of something far away remote.
I was with a wholesaler good friend to see the pearl processing family firm factory in Guangdong. That was a learning day and I was also bemused that every time I turned around a different nephew or uncle appeared. It really was a family firm.
I trained as a journalist on local papers and then magazines before going to university to study law. That led to teaching law at universities (much to my surprise) while I revived my interest in silversmithing and jewellery design. Then I fell in love with pearls. The rest, as the cliché has it, is of record and here we are.
Working here is work, really it is.
An Indonesian south sea pearl farm on a tiny remote island a 40 minute boat ride from a main island