Diamonds are Forever

Wednesday. Another 5:45 departure. Miserable. We're visiting a diamond mine today, Jwaneng, the richest diamond mine in the world by value. Pretty crazy. We load up the vans, and stop at fueling station as they call it, to grab, you guess it, fuel, and people go inside to grab snacks. I didn't, I was too tired. I probably should've gone in at the time seeing as at the time we weren't getting a breakfast from the school and its like a two hour drive from Gaborone to Jwaneng. But it turned out for the better since we took like a 45 minute detour to backtrack and pick up food from the dining hall that they had prepared for us. I grab a cup of joe as well. During the ride, we decided that we couldn't wait any longer, so we broke into the provisions. Doug had bought jerky and leechi fruit juice at the fueling station and he offered those to the meal. Juice, jerky and eggs. It was mouthwatering indeed. The unexpectedly spicy and really tough jerky was perfectly framed atop a base of egg white. The pink leechi juice was wonderfully sweet and cooled my taste buds. I am going to have to find some leechi juice in the States. I then proceeded to fall asleep for the next hour or so to the mine.

We arrive at the gate that protects the road leading up to the mine. The group disembarks our two buses, crosses over and walks 100 meters to get onto large charter bus. We travel for less than a minute and enter this reception building where we are ushered into a conference room. From there we watched a short intro video to the Jwaneng mine. Next came the security measures. We can't bring any mobile phones. Cameras are fine, but it would be that some of my comrades decided that if a mobile phone was your camera then it would be alright. Secondly, no lip gloss, or lip balms, whether they come in a stick or can form. No weapons allowed. And the most importantly rule: if you drop something, DO NOT bend over and pick it up, or even anything else off the ground; inform one of the men who work for the mine that you dropped something. Yeah, they're intense. I deduce that they don't want you picking up any diamonds that may have fallen onto the ground off one of the 300-ton ore trucks, and that should you have found one, that you didn't smoosh it into you lip balm concealing it.

After that, we got dressed in the protective gear they provided for us: hardhats, safety vests, pigmented safety glasses, and boots. Then it was back on the charter bus where we ate our breakfast: fruit, bread, boiled eggs and beans. Once we got cleared to enter the mining station proper, which took like 10 to 20 minutes, we drive for literally 30 seconds and got out again. The truck went around to take like the vehicle entrance, and we moved through revolving metal door and into a covered and enclosed walkway. The walkway was decorated with these very interesting paintings done by presumably elementary aged children. Many depicted safety topics related to touring the mining operations. One in particular was rather dreadful and had the phrase "Your safety is mine!" painted above a scene of rather disturbing looking figures. We find our bus near the exit of the hallway, and we embark yet again onto our steel steed.

This time though we are driven for more than a minute, probably closer to ten, as our huge vehicle tottered up and over the dirt slopes surrounding the open pit where mining operations are conducted. There's an observation deck on the far side of pit where we disembark to take pictures and what not. It's huge. It's a huge ovoid maw opening up into the gullet of the earth. 2000 meters at its widest and 1000 meters across. 350 meters deep. The walls of the pit are cut in approximately 15 meter steps. That's just the pit proper. Surrounding the pit are mountains and mountains of pile high rocks; rejected Kimberlite ore and the intervening rocks that they had to dig out to get to the Kimberlite. Kimberlite is the ore which diamonds are found. And they're expanding the pit another 1000 meters into the rock face, which will also result in even bigger mountains of rock. They're work around the clock 24-7, 365 days. A really brisk morning breeze is biting into us on the observation deck. Deep into the pit, I see tiny shapes of huge tankers and 300-ton trucks going about their routines. In the above pictures, I zoom in onto one of those massive trucks going up the opposite slopes, see if you can spot it from the widest shot. Little tiny men were going about some mounds in the bottom of the pit. Those mounds were explosives. Unfortunately, they weren't blasting today. The guide kept bragging about how Jwaneng is the richest by value, which he proceeded to back up by saying out of the 300 tons of ore brought up by the trucks, you'll yield probably approximately 6-8 carats of diamonds. Absolutely ridiculous when you think about it. And ludicrous to think how much these little stones are worth. There are 4,535,923.7 carats in one ton (2,000lbs). That's approximately a yield of 5E-9%. What a business.

After our photo op was done, we took a bus ride over to where several of the huge trucks were parked. Nostalgia filled me as I recalled my childhood name that I dubbed any kind of construction vehicles: "dig-dirts." I climbed atop them, and took photos while other trucks cast huge shadows while driving past us. If only the kids from high school could see the trucks I was around now, they're would be no doubt of my coolness on the 'size of truck scale.' As we were getting onto the bus, we were delayed since someone got their iPhone confiscated after they were taking pictures of the trucks. Once everyone was back on the bus, he asked again if we had any mobile devices, which again no one answered his call. There were at least two other kids who I knew were still using their camera phones. Whatever, its their fault, whatever happens to them for breaking the rules of this organization who so graciously let us take a tour of their facilities. From there we take our bus back up to the enclosed hallway. Before we disembark, our guide says that we won't be needing cameras where we're going. We set down the covered hallway, past the disturbing finger paintings, off to another hallway, where we waited outside some steel fence gates. After about 10 more minutes of waiting, we proceed through the gate and around the corner all to face a thick 8 inch door, made of steel, with circular bars retracted into the door proper; a vault. We entered the tiny vault-room which was adorned with with pictures about diamonds and the mine. Some were clearly dated. In the midst of the vault were two pedestals, each topped with a pyramidal glass case. One held a big chunk of Kimberlite ore. The other, where our guide was standing and where we subsequently stood around, contained rough diamonds. He would ramble on about more facts, about how Jwaneng yields so many jewelry quality diamonds as opposed to the smaller amounts of industrial-use diamonds. He also stressed the "cleanliness" of diamonds that they must keep so that consumers are not purchasing unethically mined diamonds, i.e. the stereotypical blood diamonds. For example, while we there, two vehicles came screaming out of the mine, sirens blazing. They're were carrying diamonds straight to the airport so that they could be flown to Gaborone HQ. After several questions concerning blood diamonds arose, he gave answers about all that he knew about them came from the movie "Blood Diamond." Though this may be true, I felt like he knew more than what he was letting onto. We left the vault and once it was secured again, we kept down the hallway to an atrium. Security, to make sure we weren't smuggling any diamonds out. There was a lofted ceiling above us so that a second floor landing with one way mirrors could peer down at us as we waited in line for 8 separate doors. The women formed one line for one door, while we the men, waited for our turn to step into one of the other seven doors. Aaron Lin stepped out of line thinking he was going to be in big trouble for still having his cell phone on him. I was told to just follow the green light above the doors. Kinda apprehensive I did as I was told and opened up my door from the seven initially, and let it shut behind me. I found myself in a room a little larger than a closet. There were two doors in front of me, each with a unlit light bulb above it. A security camera looked me over. I stood there forever. Then all of sudden, a green light appeared on the right door. I opened it to find myself in hallway that had three steps then veered off to the left. I counted two more cameras, and three more doors. One was marked, security staff only, so I guess I had to go into one of the other two. But there were no green lights, or sign of lights. I tried one of the doors. It was locked. Great. But shortly after, I heard a voice on the other side apologizing and then he opened the door for me. There was a middle aged man in the next room, asked me questions about my reasons for visiting the mine. I told him that I was a student studying for 3 weeks...yada, yada. He asked to see my passport, though he said that he had never seen a U.S. passport before and wanted to look at one. He commented that it was a really nice passport. After a quick pat down and retrieving my scanned effects, I bit the man farewell and proceeded through the door and onto a landing. As I took the stairs down to lot, I found my group. Turns out not everyone was searched, it was either random or profiling, dunno, but had I gone through the left door and down another hallway, I would've come out under the balcony, a free man.

So, in five, ten, fifteen years; whenever I get married and buy my lady a ring, I'll see whether or not the diamond(s) came from the Jwaneng Mine or not. Wouldn't that bring it full circle.

P.S. And no, I was not able to find and smuggle a diamond out.