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At the risk of two anecdotes=trend, I met a South African woman in Bali. She said she was impressed with the metalworker she contracts all her jewelry making to in town (for dirt cheap). Is this a southeast Asian thing?
Bangkok is kind of the epicenter of gemcutting. The gem markets there are pretty well off the chain. I'll probably be buying some melee (tiny loose faceted stones) off him because the price in the markets is about 1/100 what it is in the US. Silversmithing, on the other hand, requires minimal tooling and can be self-taught. There tend to be lots of talented silversmiths in places where large jewelry markets don't exist.