Walking down Shanghai’s Huaihai Road this weekend, I passed by one of the many jewelery shops selling jade bracelets. When I looked at the prices of some of them though, I almost couldn’t believe it.

These bracelets were going for 680,000 RMB (or ~ $100,000 CAD); there was also a jade necklace on display for over 800,000 RMB!

Don’t get me wrong: I realize jade can be worth more than gold, and there is jade jewelery out there worth much more than this. It’s just the way these jade items were displayed so casually in very nondescript shop windows; the same way a 50 RMB bracelet would be displayed. It’s as if an impulse buyer walking by will see it and just say, “Hmm, why not?”

I wonder if you can bargain.