On a clear day in Hualien, you can often see people picking up rocks along the seashore. Some, such as tourists, just do it for fun. Others do it for a living. If you're lucky enough, you might even happen upon a group of local Aborigines carrying heavy diving gear, including six to eight lead weights they use to sink themselves to the bottom of the ocean in their quest for precious rose stones.
Chen Ching-yun (
The lead weights, six weighing 2kg and two that weigh 1kg, allow the diver to walk freely on the seabed.
PHOTO COURTESY OF LIN MAO-YAO
Divers try to remain at a depth of no more than 20m on the ocean floor about 100m to 200m from the coastline. Beyond that range, they risk being swept away by a strong ocean current.
Treasure hunting
A man nicknamed "Hu-tz" (鬍子) said there are a dozen Aboriginal divers in the towns of Hsincheng (新城) and Hsiulin (秀林) in northern Hualien County. During the summer, they practically dive every day to search for rhodonite since the ocean currents are weak then and the water is clear when the sun shines. In the winter, however, divers need to wait patiently for the southern wind to calm the waves so that they can go treasure hunting on the ocean floor.
PHOTO COURTESY OF LIN MAO-YAO
Instead of looking for black-colored rose stones, as they are found in their natural state on land or in rivers, experienced divers look for white rocks sitting on the ocean bed. Seawater eats away at the black oxidized patina that forms on the surface of rhodonite, turning it white. As Hu-tz pointed out, the whiter the unprocessed stones appear under the sea, the redder they become once they have been brought to shore.
These rose stones are brought down from the Chilai mountains (奇萊山), part of the Central Mountain Range in Hualien, by the ferocious force of typhoons, tropical storms that make landfall on Hualien almost every year. Heavy rains and mudslides carry the stones down to nearby streams, that push the rocks into rivers, which carry them into the ocean. This natural process must have been going on for many centuries, although at the present no one knows for sure how many rose stones are still resting on the seabed, along a 50km length of coast line in Hualien County from Ta Chingshui (大清水) to Chihsingtan (七星潭).
Degrees of beauty
PHOTO: DEREK LEE, TAIPEI TIMES
According to Chen Tian-lai (陳天來), a retired teacher and a self-taught rose stone expert living by the Sanchan Stream (三棧溪, a truly fine rose stone must meet some important criteria. First of all, the stone's natural color has to be as close to rose-red as possible. Second, the patterns on its surface ought to resemble a beautiful natural landscape. Third, the stone must be hard like a precious stone, meaning it ought to have a hardness of five to six degrees, according to the international stone measurement standard. Marble's hardness, for instance, only reaches the third degree. The best rose stones are "seven-color rose stones" (七彩玫瑰石), which are prized for their apple-green color. A good 50kg rock costs about NT$30,000 when it is sold to a dealer.
When asked how these Aborigines acquired their knowledge of diving, Chen Ching-yun took a deep drag on his cigarette and smiled wryly: "You know, many of our tribal youths have been drafted to serve in the Marine Corps and trained as frogmen or underwater demolition experts. So, ocean diving is a piece of cake to most of us." If the stones found beneath the sea are too heavy, they use buoyancy bags like the Navy does to float them to the sea surface and push them ashore.
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Risky business
Hsieh Ming-feng (謝明峰) , who used to be a candy distributor, and his wife, both middle-aged, have run a factory where they slice rose stones into thin pieces and frame them as art. According to Hsieh, collecting rose stones from the ocean is a very dangerous business. As far as he knows, at least one person drowns each year while trying to collect stones. A few years back, as many as seven people drowned on the same day when they used to risk running back and forth on the seashore against the strong ocean tides that had been whipped up in the aftermath of a typhoon.
Hsieh and his wife themselves had once been swept back to the shore by a wave that was as high as a three-story building. They both admitted that they were simply too caught up in looking for stones. Later, they found that tiny grains of sand had somehow penetrated their skin, and it took quite a long time for them to get the sand out of their hands and feet. Chen Ching-yun also disclosed sadly that some of his tribal men developed decompression sickness after a few years and they are not getting proper medical attention at the moment.
One shocking scene that made a strong impression on Hsieh was that of an Aborigine kneeling down to lift a rose stone on his back. He saw the blood spraying out of the man's nose like a sprinkler. Recalling that image, Hsieh said he has never again wanted to bargain down the price for a rock delivered by an Aborigine.
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