Jungle Gems.com Newsletter / Sept 2004
Hello from Teofilo Otoni, Minas Gerais Brasil.
I’d like to welcome all of you new subscribers to our newsletter of updates in the gem and mineral trade here in Brasil. I report on current events, updates of old news, mining news when available, even gemstone rumors and gossip too!
We have been fortunate for most of this past month to welcome many visitors here in gemstone country, some for the first time. We all had a great time at the main FIPP gem and mineral show here in Teofilo Otoni, which ran from Aug 17th thru Aug 22nd. There were more foreign visitors here this year than last year, and business seemed to be good for all. As with any show it is just not possible to describe everything, so I’ll let the photos do the talking. Inserted below are some of the goods that caught our eyes. Our good friend Jeffrey Gale, who also lives here in town, did the photography…
The above photos show only a small sampling of what was on display. The show did a great job of supplying a wide variety of goods. The happiest dealers seemed to be those selling rough gem material. I saw a lot of cutting rough, including rutilated qtz, rose qtz, smokey qtz, citrine, topaz, tourmaline, aquamarine, diamond and emerald. The fancy rose Imperial Topaz was especially nice. I hope to see more of our readers here next year! I’ll let you know the dates for next years’ show right here in the jungle-gems.com newsletter.
ATTN visiting dealers: This is very important news for anyone who buys gemstones the “old-fashioned way” here in Brasil. Last week, almost all of the moneychangers, as cambistas, were shut down by the Brasilian Federal Police. Many wealthy and influential money brokers are still in jail as of this writing. Make arrangements in advance with the Brasilian Central Banking system, or check with your favorite cambista, for your money transfers before leaving your home country. Many dealers are paralyzed due to lack of money transfer capabilities. It’s a real nightmare for some.
Deal of the month: The office is about to undergo a renovation, and one of our office specimens must find a new home. I have enjoyed looking at this piece for many years, but now it must go on to someone else. The photo below doesn’t do it justice…
If anyone has any interest, we can ship direct to your door anywhere in the world. Contact me for more info at www.jungle-gems.com
If any of you regular readers haven’t checked the website lately, you might not be aware that everything is on sale. We are accepting almost any offer on all goods. In fact, any dealers out there interested in making an offer for everything on the site? After comparing prices and goods here at the Brasilian gem shows, our Brasilianites are very well priced as well as our complete line of quartz products. Remember please that you are invited to make any reasonable offer for anything that might catch your eye, and the more pieces involved, the better price I can give.
ATTN Diamond Rough Buyers: My company is NOT known as a supplier of diamond rough, but I have recently had offers of gem grade rough diamonds… if this is of any interest to our readers. I can be reached at: country code 55-33-9985-2790 for further details, or thru www.jungle-gems.com
More diamond news: Rumor has it that the famous Roosevelt Reserve diamond deposit in Rondonia is still very active, clandestinely. It is still very illegal to trade in goods from one of the richest deposits in South America, the Indian Reservation of the Cinta Larga and other tribes in this border region of the Amazon with Bolivia. But, during the course of our gem show here in Teofilo Otoni I had a very interesting conversation with someone who has been living in an Indian village on those very same lands for the past two years. He has some stories, as you might well understand, that this brief newsletter doesn’t allow me to go into. But what he has confirmed is the tense situation between invading miners, irate tribesmen, and the Brasilian Military and Federal Police. The situation is nowhere near being resolved despite talk of legalizing operations within the reservation. One important note: the death toll of invading miners is much higher than reported in the world press. If you have any wild ideas of approaching this area, I strongly advise you to forget it J
We spent some time this month seeking out large specimens for a client, and thought I’d show our readers some of the huge wonders we came across.
The largest piece shown above is over 1500kg and the smallest is around 100kg’s. Doesn’t everyone need a big specimen for the back yard? Maybe poolside? Please contact us if you too want a BIG specimen.
If you read last month’s newsletter, you saw where we’ve been while spending some time away from the gem business… the gorgeous cliff-side beaches of southern Bahia, Brasil. I teamed up with my two friends Carmine & Dr. Ed, to purchase our piece of paradise: 53 acres of beachfront. Through the course of seeking out our place I also found many other choice pieces of property for sale. It was a difficult choice to pick one, as many other sites are also fantastic and I’m not wealthy enough to own them all! So I’m offering some of these other super beachfront property offers here at the end of my gem trade newsletter. I’ll try to include an offer in each newsletter throughout the coming summer (Dec-Mar here in the southern hemisphere) when I hope to be spending plenty of time at my new place. Prices range from as low as US$40,000 for a 15m x 30m lot right on the beach. Some areas have kilometers of beachfront available, which are way out of my budget capabilities, but which might interest some of you readers. Check out this months offer below:
Gorgeous eh? This offer includes 12,000 sq. meters of land (about 5 acres), with 400 meters (about 400 yards) of sandy beachfront around the peninsula and down the shoreline, as shown above. There are 2 waterfalls onto the beach, a brick/cement bar with fabulous views from the upper deck, a caretakers residence with 4-br, 4 separate rental units all with bath and ac, and of course, the incredible views over the ocean from the top of the bluffs. Full registered documentation, legal for foreigners to own. Asking price is only US$450,000 and I would consider participating as a partner. Please contact me for more info if it is time for you too to own beachfront property.
Well folks, that’s the latest from Brasil in a nutshell. We hope to be back soon with another newsletter of gem trade related news direct from Brasil.
Regards ~ Kirk “Tomas” Bond, pres. www.jungle-gems.com