I thought you might enjoy seeing my video of hand drilling natural pearls with a bow drill.

I took this video when visiting Bahrain which is a small country on the shore of the Persian/Arabian Gulf. Bahrain specializes in natural pearls.

It's an amateurish video but I couldn't figure out how to edit out the blurry part a the end, so just left it as it was.

You may wonder why I use both Persian & Arabian Gulf. It's because after visiting most of the countries bordering the Gulf - UAE, Oman, Iran, Kuwait, Bahrain & Qatar, I came to learn that both of these names are special but to different people groups, so sometimes I include them both.

The driller is drilling a hole in a natural pearl that is only 0.5mm in size.

It's totally mind boggling to me how these very tiny, tiny pearls can be drilled. I know that the "bigger the better" seems to be the trend in pearls these days, but seriously, after realizing the immense difficulty to drill tiny seed pearls - they have become my all time favorite!

I felt honored to be shown a personal demonstration of this skill but I was sad to hear that it can be detrimental to the driller, as because of the very fine detailed work, one's eyesight can be severely damaged or even blindness can develop.

I was so fascinated by this demonstration that I even bought a bow drill for myself and brought home a few slabs of a coconut tree from Kenya. But I have never tried to do it myself - not yet anyway.

To see more detailed photos of this process there are several on this page of my website.

My children, all grown now - and I have seven of them, have totally revolutionized my life and add immense richness to me.

God bless and thanks for reading,