Military-themed to the Movies : Casio G-Shock Camo2

Happy Eid Mubarak to my fellow readers and WIS, and hope you all have safe journeys and a good time during this holy festive season...

It's 2.30am now and my wife and I just came back from a back-to-back movie marathon. It was supposed to be just 1 movie actually; but then we decided to be like teenagers again and caught another movie right after the 1st movie ended. Plus the fact that we got excellent seats for both movies helped.

Those were great movies, and I highly-recommend a viewing over the Raya for the fun of it. Pretty witty and worth the tickets really.

Over Lebaran, I added another catch to my collection and it was the Casio G-Shock Camo2. Remember the Camo-series that was released the previous summer?

Well, Casio went back to the drawing board and came back with variations from the initial Camo-series- which some WIS were referring as Camo2. I was pretty interested in the Camo-series and always thought about adding a piece. Well, Camo2 then came about and it had the best of both worlds- the display was no longer negative display (my Rangeman Military was already sporting one), and the Illuminator button was now in steel. Add to the competitive price point at circa RM650 and Casio clearly has a winner here.

Well, it was akin to "Shut up and take my monies already!"; and so there I was, sporting my newly-acquired Camo2 to the movies tonight. And yeah, I think that the new colour combination was pretty spot-on actually!

More pictures and review coming up soon.

Caterham F1 Team : G-Shock Rangeman Military

I would admit that Tan Sri Tony Fernandes' Team Lotus-Caterham F1 Team held a sweet spot in my heart. And it was very much a loss to all its fans when the team went under administration late last year and was ultimately sold off at a token sum of £1 with its liabilities incurred during the seasons to boot.

Why was the team so close to my heart then?

Lotus : It was the initial Team Lotus, and I have always loved Lotus cars having experienced the Elise Mk1 in the 90s. I believe Tun Dr Mahathir was holding helm at Proton Holdings then, and it was a visit to the Proton factory that I had the opportunity to try the Elise. I was sold on the car and hoped to own that lightweight sports car someday. The day has yet to materialise though, as there was always some more important family matters to provide for over the years. I still harbour the hope to have an Elise in my parking spot someday though.

Caterham : The Caterham Seven, based on the Lotus Seven, was an even more hardcore and super-lightweight car that tugged the heartstrings of car enthusiasts worldwide. It had looks that distinctly divided the general public into 2 camps- those whom loved it, and those whom don't. No prizes for guessing which camp I was in then.

Tony F : I have been fortunate to meet the acquaintance of TS Tony a couple of times, and he was indeed a friendly and shrewd businessman. I admired the man for his business acumen and bigger-than-life personality, and all the while using this personality to further PR for his businesses. Compared to some of the Neandertal-grade politicians whom spout nonsense from time to time, I find it refreshing that Malaysia has talents as this man, whose words were good as gold.

Put all these together, and it was no surprise that I would be supportive of the Team. In fact, I had been collecting some of their Team merchandises from overseas travels, before the Team went under. For after the Team went under, the stocks of their merchandises cleared off pretty quickly as fans snapped the momentos for collection. A quick check on their official merchandise online stores showed the following :

And quite by coincidence, I found that the G-Shock Rangeman Military in its green-and-yellow colour combinations, matched the green-and-yellow livery of the Team rather perfectly.

Selling Wave Sweeps Across Asia

And that was the headline from Edge today. Bursa and other Asian share markets suffered a dip yesterday from the selling wave. Add in the 1MDB woes and the depreciation of RM of late, and the general sentiment in the local economy was increasingly less positive these few months. Sigh...

Since this was a watch blog after all, a recent visit to some watch boutiques revealed that sales had been sluggish. And with the depreciating RM and 6% GST, the resellers had no choice but to mark up their watches as their purchase costs had increased too. Discounts were much more controlled too in view that they needed to generate the bare minimum to keep the mortar and brick businesses in check.

My concerns were generally on business and economy these days, and choosing my daily wear had been a very straightforward affair. I would choose either of the Rollie siblings to accompany me through the daily challenges. The Sub on days when I could do with a bit of bling (the green dial was a beauty to look at), and the Explorer 2 on every other day.

The Pelagos sees some action on weekends, as I charged up its lume in the day and my sons loved watching the lume at night in the dark.

The Speedy Panda was my wife's de-facto sports watch since the day I brought it home- as it seemed to be too small on me and just just nice for my wife, bearing in mind that it was a growing fad for ladies to adorn larger watches these days.

The other watches generally see no action at all and just sit pretty in the winders and cases.

Going forward, I am considering flipping the Pelagos and ProMaster DepthMeter, to top-up for another Speedy. That way, both my wife and me could wear his-and-hers Speedy during some of our dates. I have the 42mm Moonwatch in mind, but let's just see until after the watches were flipped. 

As I frequently travel abroad, I could get the Speedy at the overseas ADs and save some monies in the process.

With the economy and local share market in the current sentiments, another WIS shared with me this morning that he would be mainly looking for good pre-owned watches in the secondary market instead of buying new watches. This way, he could still get his satisfaction from flipping watches, which was his second nature.

Let's all cross our fingers and hope that our economy pulls through intact. In the meantime, it could be best to listen to our beloved Deputy Finance Minister Ahmad Maslan's advice to self-cook non-GST fried rice at home for the additional savings. He could really goreng pretty well, couldn't he?

Queries from Readers About Citizen ProMaster DepthMeter

I received 3 e-mails over 2 weeks with regards to the 2014 Baselworld-released Citizen ProMaster DepthMeter from fellow readers whom were interested in the said watch, and thought that I would take a bit of time to write about this watch.

I had earlier wrote a first impression about this watch @ http://andywristwatches.blogspot.com/2015/01/first-impression-citizen-promaster.html. Lately, there were a few overseas watch blogs and reviews that highlighted great watches to get for the summer and amongst the highly-recommended fellas were Tudor Pelagos and Citizen ProMaster DepthMeter.

For a watch that costs a mere 20% of the Tudor Pelagos' RRP yet armed with more sophisticated diving mechanisms, the Citizen ProMaster DepthMeter was indeed a great buy for the summer. And Malaysia being a country with all-year-round summer, getting the DepthMeter was then, a no-brainer decision really.

I frequently checked out ADs for new arrivals and I dare say that this DepthMeter had not be seen much in the ADs. One of the rarer AD that I have chanced upon this DepthMeter was at KLIA back in March, where I was offered the watch (they received 3 pieces, and 2 pieces were sold within the week when I saw the 3rd one they had) for RM3,220 nett. Of course, the watch would have long been sold by now and anyway, expect the price to have increased with the imposition of the 6% GST at circa RM190 extra.

Given its relatively-rare status, getting a unit at ADs was an issue; and ordering it online from overseas had its fair bit of risks. As such, the readers directed me to 3 adverts on a local site and asked if these were genuine pieces by my reckoning.

Advert 1 : Citizen Professional Master Diver Computer @ RM3,500

Advert 2 : Citizen Professional Depth Meter from Japan @ RM3,300

Advert 3 : Citizen ProMaster DepthMeter BN2024 + Suppa Adapter + Zulu Strap @ RM2,900

As far as I knew, there were no replicas for this DepthMeter so there should only be genuine Citizen Japan-issued examples in the market. Anyway, this watch has diving depth measurement and in-built memory, so you could easily test it out (factory standard memory was at 60m) and gauge if the rapid descent alarm was working as it should. Fake watches would not have these functions for sure, as these were costly modules made for real diving usages.

Given that the watch was Japan-made and our Malaysian currency had been depreciating (currently at its lowest in the last 9 years, if I remembered correctly), it was only expected that the price of the DepthMeter would be on an increasing trend given that its cost in Yen would translate to more RM necessary these days.

And from the 3 adverts above, I may be biased but I would chose to get from Alternative Channels simply because it was offering the most competitive price, and its offer came complete with the Suppa USA adapter and Zulu strap.

The lume of the DepthMeter was simply crazy and charges up very easily. If you were a soldier engaged in combat warfare, you don't want to wear this watch as its bright lume would easily give your position away. Period.

Another query asked by one of the readers was whether the size of the watch was liveable. Well, I used to own the Citizen EcoZilla and Omega Planet Ocean XL, both of which were well-known large diver watches, so I would deemed the DepthMeter as being wearable. However, it was better to get the Suppa adaptor so that you could match more comfortable aftermarket 22mm straps on this watch as the original rubber strap was rather hard and unwieldy. Not an issue if it was strapped on your diving suit, but if you were an office diver only, you would want to match the watch with softer options such as Nato, Zulu, leather or Isofrane rubber.

I would give you a relative size comparison in the below pictures for the DepthMeter compared to the 40mm Rolex Submariner, 42mm Rolex Explorer2, and 42mm Tudor Pelagos.

The DepthMeter is 49mm without sensor and crown, and 52.5mm with sensor and crown. Height is 18mm and weight is a hefty 178g. No one would call you a sissy when you have this Hulk of a diver strapped to your wrist, that was for sure.

At the end of the day, I believe that if you were a fan of macho diver watches, the DepthMeter should rightfully earn its place in your collection. Period.

Clash of The Titans : Seiko Prospex

There had been quite a no. of e-mails in my mailbox that expressed concerns if I was stopping work on the blog. Well, the good or the bad of it, depending on how you enjoyed this blog thus far, was that it was still alive and kicking. It was just that life has been quite hectic of late - what with steering the ship the best that we could in this economic climate, plus supervising the renovation of a couple of houses for rental thereafter. And the fact that the rental ceiling has been floored during the period of renovation, due in part to the depressed economy associated with the negative news of 1MDB and a possible government bailout and Moody's possible de-classification, ain't exactly happy thoughts that would motivate me to put pen to paper on my blog.

But I digress. There may be some hard times coming ahead for the country as a whole but we would just need to persevere on and survive the interim period. The fundamental of the country is still strong, and with good planning, sound policies and some good luck, we could just turn the tide around. Malaysia Boleh!

Back to watches then.

Last year, I wrote about my interest to get the Seiko Prospex SRP639K1 with RRP : RM1,922.50. To me, it was a rather handsome watch with striking colours that made it looked like the IWC Aquatimer's sibling. The stainless steel shroud protector on the Seiko made it a pretty beefy and badass watch, and it was going at 15% off last year as it was a newly-launched model. The street price then was RM1,630.

Given the slow economy coupled with GST, sales of watches had been slowing down. Suddenly, a watch shop had gone on Groupon to do a clearance on its stocks on this model at a massive 40% discount to sell at RM1,159. Hard to believe?! Well, here it was :

A quick check online revealed that this price was indeed cheaper than the other offers online, one of the next-best offer as per the following :

And while it may looked really tempting, before you shout, "Shut up and take my money already!", there was another new Seiko Prospex (Tuna) in town, and it was the model no. SRP 655K1 with RRP : RM2,650. A quick check at the AD over the weekend showed that stocks were starting to trickle in and there was 0% discount at the shops given its relatively new launch. Expect to pay full asking prices for these special edition Prospex Tuna.

There was therefore a real street price difference of circa RM1,100 between both Seiko Prospex models at the interim period, with both Baby Tunas looking equally attractive. If you were to choose between one of them, which one would it be then?

A Journey Through My Horological Collection (Continuous Updates)

An update on the watches that are/were in my collection, as per the following :

Current :

1) 1978 Pagol Sub-Second Date 3055;
2) 2005 Tag Heuer Kirium Ti5;
3) 2012 Rolex Submariner 116610LV;
4) 2012 Rolex Explorer 2 216570;
5) 2013 Tudor Pelagos Ti5;
6) 2015 Citizen ProMaster DepthMeter Suppa;
7) 2015 Omega Speedmaster Panda;
8) 2015 Casio G-Shock Rangeman Wave-Ceptor.

Previously-flipped :

Vintage (prior to 1983) :
1)  1972 Rolex Datejust 1601;

Diver :
2)   2006 Omega Seamaster Chronometer James Bond;
3)   2007 Seiko Perpetual Calendar SNQ043;
4)   2012 Ball Hydrocarbon John Hembel Limited Edition;
5)   2012 Rolex Submariner 116610LN;
6)   2013 Seiko Monster Dracula;
7)   2013 Omega Seamaster Chronometer Planet Ocean XL;
8)   2014 Citizen Eco-Zilla;
9)   2014 Citizen Eco-Zilla Suppa;
10) 2014 Seiko Diver Pepsi SKX009J1;
11) 2014 Orient Mechanical Force;
12) 2014 Steinhart Ocean Vintage Military;
13) 2014 Steinhart GMT-Ocean Ceramic;
14) 2014 Steinhart Ocean Forty-Four;
15) 2014 Oris Aquis Date;
16) 2014 Edox GMT-Class 1 Ti;
17) 2014 Glycine Combat Sub;
18) 2014 Tudor Heritage Black Bay;
19) 2014 Seiko Prospex Kinetic GMT;
20) 2015 Maranez Rawai;

Aviation :
21) 2013 Seiko Sportura Aviation Alarm Chrono;
22) 2014 Bell & Ross BR01-97 Reserve De Marche;
23) 2014 Seiko Prospex Field Monster Limited Edition;

Dress/Race :
24) 2012 Rolex Datejust Diamond;
25) 2012 Oris Artelier Date;
26) 2013 Tag Heuer Carrera Chrono Caliber 16;
27) 2014 Hamilton Vintage Chrono 3828;
28) 2014 Edox Les Vauberts;
29) 2014 Certina DS Podium GMT;

Sports/Fashion :
30) 2013 Ball Fireman Night Train DLC;
31) 2014 SevenFriday P3-01 DLC;
32) 2014 Casio G-Shock Riseman;
33) 2014 Casio G-Shock Riseman Wave-Ceptor;
34) 2014 Casio G-Shock Military Camo;
35) 2014 Casio G-Shock Digi-Analog.

Query on Rubber B VulChromatic for Rolex Submariner

Just like to tap some real life information from readers of Rubber B on their Rolex timepieces.

I am an Isofrane convert and generally likes nothing better than to fit Isofrane on my diver watches. However, I really like how the Rubber B fits nicely to cover the gap where the solid end links were. Plus the VulChromatic version has a nice strip of colour to match the Sub bezel, which was pretty cool by my book.

Question was... the Isofrane was relatively affordable at USD99 while the Rubber B costs between USD240 (solid colour) - USD280 (VulChromatic), so how do any current users found these Rubber B straps? Are they soft and comfortable on the wrist, and do they have the vanilla flavour too? If you have any pictures, would appreciate that too. I just don't want to spend USD280 to get the Rubber B strap, only to regret not opting for the Isofrane Nato Green later.

Thanks in advance!