I was doing a little research tonight on a shopping site, and I did a search for Turquoise beads.
2290 items.... well that's too many. So I put in 'Natural Turquoise beads not Howlite', 2160 items returned. Sigh, so as I shuffled through the listings I noticed, Orange, Pink, White, Yellow, Purple, Bright Blue, Lime Green... awful ugly beads, crosses, skulls. Nothing like what I was looking for, which was natural, real turquoise beads in traditional turquoise color. I flagged a few, then realized that was fruitless, there were just too many.
Do people buy this stuff? Now I will be the first one to admit, I have purchased some dyed howlite or magnesite beads. But I knew what they were. And I certainly didn't try to pass them off as "real turquoise" to anyone. I bought a few of the carved skulls, in black and white, these wild orange, yellow and hot pink skulls are awful.
But what really yanks my chain are the listings for beads that look like turquoise, almost. You know they are not, but the seller merrily describes them as Turquoise, they don't say where it's from or what mine. How can they? They came from China.
to be continued....
