KARACHI: Among the many voices of shopkeepers urging you to step into their shop in the ever-bustling Zainab Market, the woman with the cropped grey hair goes from shop to shop asking if they have the chirhhya. She stops at the relic jewellery counters inquiring about it and everyone tells her to go to Babu Bhai’s shop, number 50. Then she goes about asking every other shop if they happen to be shop no. 50 or if she is looking at Babu Bhai until her search comes to an end successfully.

The chirhhya is a ring with a little birdie, a mix between a parrot, pigeon and an eagle, perched on top and encrusted with semi-precious stones. But the woman is hoping to find a locket with the bird and Babu Bhai, the shopkeeper, offers to string a chain through the ring so that it can also be worn around the neck. “They only come in the form of rings,” he explains to her with a shrug, adding that the piece of jewellery has its origins in Kuchi jewellery from Afghanistan. The woman then asks for the price and is told Rs300, which she is not very pleased to hear and walks on.

But ‘Babu Bhai’s shop’ has on offer a treasure trove of vintage-inspired items of jewellery on which one would want to spend more time there to explore. The shop was opened 70 years ago, soon after Partition in 1947, by Babu Bhai’s father who now sits quietly on a stool in a corner and watches his son and grandsons, Bilal and Noman, run the business. “You can call us wholesalers, retailers and manufacturers, too,” says Bilal, the older of the two grandsons. “We have pieces not just from Afghanistan but Rajasthan in India and Nepal also,” he adds while bringing out a box full of German silver earrings from Nepal resembling the shape of tulip seashells.

The main wall of the shop displays necklaces, lockets, earrings, studs, head bands or matha patti, bangles, bracelets and anklets. Underneath there are boxes full of more bracelets, rings and earrings.

The metal used in making most of the jewellery, especially the Kuchi pieces, is German silver or brass. “And if the brass loses its shine and darkens with time it looks even better,” smiles the shopkeeper.

Some rings among the most dramatic-looking pieces have so much presence and are so big that they hide most of your fingers and hand. A bangle looks like it is made of ivory but the shopkeeper corrects you, saying that it is actually made from camel bone. They also have many blue-eye jewellery pieces known to ward off the evil eye. Long-beaded necklaces make you want to reach out and touch them but they also all turn out to be artificial pearls.

Another female customer searches through these carefully. She says that she is going to visit friends abroad and wanted to buy exquisite, ethnic jewellery from here as gifts for them. She thought some pieces looked Turkish or Iranian but the shopkeepers inform her honestly that they were from Afghanistan mostly and encrusted with cheap stones due to which they cost between Rs300 and Rs500. A box of bracelets had every bracelet priced at Rs100 each. “Because they are copies of the original stuff and are all China-manufactured,” laughs Babu Bhai.

“Though this jewellery is not expensive at all, it is very much in demand, especially abroad, so China, too, has jumped into it,” he adds.

“We do have some pieces encrusted with semi-precious stones such as lapis lazuli but if you are really looking for genuine antique jewellery I suggest you go looking for it in jewellery shops. I would call everything on sale at my shop ‘fancy’ but not particularly original though we do also get a few original pieces sometimes,” he says while pointing to a big necklace with a red stone in the middle. “That one is a real antique piece, by the way, and is priced at Rs6,000. It is the most expensive item here,” he says.

Published in Dawn, August 6th, 2017