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According to the Wikipedia,
Diamonds
are the hardest known natural material …, and is
the more costly of the two best known forms (allotropes)
of carbon, whose hardness and high dispersion of
light make it useful for industrial applications and
jewellery.
(The other equally well known allotrope is
graphite.) Diamonds are specifically renowned as a
mineral with superlative physical qualities.
For centuries, stunning, rare & select
diamonds, regardless of cut (heart, round, princess,
marquise, emerald, oval, pear, radiant &
trilliant) remain the symbol of true love and
romance. They
represent radiant beauty, new beginnings, and a
future filled with hopes and dreams.
Diamond jewelry worn as an engagement ring, a
wedding ring, by the woman of one’s devotion, on
the left-hand ring finger, indicates her fidelity
and faithfulness to her present or future spouse.
For those not ready to plunge into that level
of commitment, a pair of diamond earrings, with
matching diamond necklace, or diamond pendant, are
classic choices to express a man’s affection to
the woman of his fancy.
So why do we say, “Diamonds are a girl’s best
friend”? It
may be going a long way back for some of us, and for
many, you may have never seen or heard of it before,
but in 1953 Marilyn Monroe sang the song,
"Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend" in the
colorful movie, Gentlemen Prefer Blonds,
directed by Howard Hanks.
The song tells about how girls do not need
men, just the money they can get out of them.
It was one of our country’s early woman’s
liberation power songs.
Fast forwarding to 1971, to a more contemporary
spy thriller, we were thrust into a setting of
greed, power and intrigue in the movie, Diamonds
Are Forever starring Sean Connery as 007, based
on the book by Ian Fleming.
The basic plot follows James Bond and his
efforts to solve the mystery of diamonds that have
been stolen from South African mines, and eluding
two offbeat assassins who are killing everyone in
the smuggling ring one-by-one.
The use of the diamonds, harnessing their
dazzling polished brilliance, they are cleverly
arrayed in a satellite to create a “death ray”
gun for the purposes of controlling the world.
Lastly, of course, the most recent movie release
in 2006, revealing a darker side to the diamond
mining industry, Blood Diamond.
The action-drama is about the moral
conundrums of the international gem trade, and
offers us, in its unique fashion, an opportunity to
examine the ethics behind your engagement ring.
The Sierra Leonean rebels trade precious
gems, mined by captives for money and weapons,
middlemen sneak the diamonds over the border to
Liberia. Thus,
as inferred by the movie, we end up subsidizing the
death of thousands when we buy our diamond earrings,
bracelets and necklaces to celebrate one’s
anniversary. Blood Diamond shows us the path
of one anonymous African through this process and,
how a smuggler's, Leonardo DiCaprio, moral compass
changes direction as a consequence.
The truth be known, the popularity of diamonds,
by design, has risen since the 19th century because
of increased supply, improved cutting and polishing
techniques, growth in the world economy, and
innovative and successful advertising campaigns.
About 130 million carats (26,000 kg) are
mined annually, with a total value of nearly USD $9
billion. About 100 tons are synthesized annually. Roughly 49% of diamonds originate from central and southern
Africa, although significant sources of the mineral
have been discovered in Canada, India, Russia,
Brazil, and Australia. They are generally mined from
volcanic pipes, which are deep in the Earth where
the high pressure and temperature enables the
formation of the crystals.
But wait a minute, in this day of space-age
technology and wonders, diamonds no longer have to
be mined; they can be formed through man-made
efforts. That
is true, but even though synthetic diamonds are
produced each year, at nearly four times the rate of
natural diamonds, the vast majority of synthetic
diamonds created are small imperfect shaped
gemstones suitable only for industrial-grade use.
Hence, their use in jewelry is very limited,
and mining, at least for the foreseeable future,
will not have sufficient political pressure to
cease.
Concluding, we hope you found this gem of an
article was worth it’s weight in gold, by not
presenting another boring teaching on the “four
Cs”: carat, clarity, color, and cut of diamond
stones. Like
DiCaprio’s depiction of the wayward smuggler in Blood
Diamond, the true quality of a prized colourful
character, person or earthy rock, is, for lack of a
better analogy, “a diamond in the rough”.
References:
http://en.wikipedia.org/
http://www.moviediva.com/MDJr_root/MDjr/Blonds.htm
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0066995/
http://www.boston.com/movies/display?display=movie&id=9301
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