Pick Of The Day

I didn't realised it until my missus remarked that I seemed to spend no time in picking my morning watches these days. She was a gym junkie and wakes up early every morning to hit the gym. While she was getting dressed, I would have dressed up in my work attire and would ponder for a couple of minutes on which watch was to adorn my wrist for the day. 

But of late, it had been more of a reflex action- I would inevitably pick the Rolex Hulk as my daily-beater; or the Rolex SDc if there was a more important meeting. The reason for the latter was because I noticed that every other person in the meetings would sport a Submariner on their wrists; but I have yet to see anyone with the more elusive SDc. So it inevitably became my personal choice during such meetings.

The funny thing was, many people remarked that the SDc was too thick to fit under the cuffs, and too heavy to wear comfortably. But those whom were critical of the SDc were also the same ones whom don't own this model. Most of them were Sub owners. I could understand the prejudice towards SDc. After all, both these watches utilise Rolex caliber 3135, had date functions, were of the 40mm genre, and were relatively similar to the untrained eyes. Yet, the Sub retails at USD8,550 while the SDc retails at USD10,800- so it was relatively easy to say that SDc was not worth the additional USD2,550 premium over the Sub. 

But the SDc was a champion in its own right. It could be used for diving depths 4 times to that of the Sub's, although that was irrelevant to most of us desk-divers. Further, real divers commonly use dive computer watches to assist their dives these days. It had a more symmetrical dial like that of the SubND, without the cyclops protruding like a sore thumb. It's matt dial looked deep and different- more toolish compared to the reflective Sub dial. And it's lug case looked so much more refined and smoother- not as though it was on steroids like the Sub's. It was heavier, no doubt about that- but I liked the heft and the domed crystal so all was well. And my SDc was still without a nary of a scratch (touch wood!), so that showed that you could wear it in good fashion too and it would fit under the cuffs.

With this insight, I also realised that I have yet to wear the Ball Engineer ii Genesis since the day I received it. It was still sitting brand new in the watch winder. Although, at nights, I would often walk over casually to see the Genesis spinning lazily in the winder. The 1mm-thick micro-tubes were simply like torches in the dark. Bright doesn't quite describe them. Hmmm...

My Versatile SDc.

My versatile SDc. At home on the wrist, whether at work or sitting in traffic.

E-mail from Reader : Keep Calm & Buy Watches

I received an e-mail from a "reader" whom complained that she saw my blogspot bookmarked on her husband and her shared MacBook, and she was worried that her husband may be picking up this hobby that might be detrimental on their shared savings. She rationalised that her husband and her already had a pair of Omega Constellation; so she saw no reason that he should be thinking of getting additional watches.

I thought that it was an interesting e-mail and therefore chose it as part of the "E-mail from Reader" series to be shared with the rest of the readers. If Mr and Mrs MacBook was reading this post, then it would be all the more interesting.

I wrote this blog as part of a shared journal on my watch-collecting journey. Over the years, I could literally see my directional changes as my taste got more refined and selective, and my preferences got further reinforced. If I knew as much as what I had known right now, my collection would have been very much more focused and I may have saved more monies from lesser flips. But then again, this would have been a really simple blog with just a couple of entries over the years then.

From memory, my first watch looked kinda like this- an Eagle 7 from Citizen Japan.

My Dad was a watch smith, so I was intrigued by watches from a very young age. I remembered the first watch that my Dad got me- a boy-size Citizen Eagle 7 automatic watch when I was in my primary school. All the other boys had electronic Casio watches with stop-watch function, and I thought that mine was an old-man watch being a chunk of metal and all. But I liked it as Dad was wearing a similar watch, and I thought that it was cool that father-and-son were wearing similar watches. And so began my love towards mechanical watches.

The Casio Edifice that I had looked kinda like this.

When I started working, and pay was a paltry RM1,500 per month, which with I made allocations towards mortgage, car hire-purchase, room rental, monthly subsistence and some (not much really after the earlier deductibles) token sum for my parents; Dad bought me a watch that I thought was pretty cool then- a Casio Edifice. I still remembered that it was the first time Casio came out with that series in 2000, and I wore the watch as my daily-beater for the next few years.

Swatch had cheap and cheerful alternatives!

Then, I got to know about affordable Swiss watches in the form of Swatch watches; and then perpetual calendar watch (yeah, no need to set the dates no more!) in the form of Seiko; and each watch that I bought or was gifted was a serious daily-beater. In all instances, they were all quartz watches.

As I climbed the corporate ladder and became more matured, I found that I had started thinking about getting back to mechanical watches. I remembered the first watch that Dad had given me. And so in 2012, I started tinkering in mechanical watches as could be tracked from entries in My Flipped List. I dabbled in various brands, and across many genres; before I found myself settling down towards Automatic watches and of the Diver genre. And from a list of 54 watches that I had or still own today, I found that the ones that I really liked could be summarised to Tudor Pelagos, Rolex Submariner, and Rolex Sea-Dweller Ceramic. The Sea-Dweller Ceramic, was in a way, really a blend of the Pelagos and Submariner- having both their strengths minus the cyclops and plus the heft; so it was my fave go-to watch these days.

If I hadn't started on my horological journey, I might not have found my personal preferences in watches and would still be ignorant about the complexities of the movements, brands, materials, etc. I am, therefore, glad that I had ventured this path and learnt so much in the process. And I will continue learning on, although my purchases would be more selective as time goes on, all pun intended.

So to Mr Macbook, keep calm and explore more watches... In doing so, you may just discover your true self :)

Seiko Turtle : Pepsi vs Coke vs PADI

Readers would know that I recently netted the Seiko Turtle Pepsi and truly liked the piece. It was nice to have the vintage turtle piece, modernised to the current acceptable size and very much wearable without fear of vintage WR gaskets and parts.

While looking around at a watch shop, I chanced upon the Seiko Turtle Coke. The red minute hand really caught my attention and the salesperson informed that they had only received one piece todate. It was retailing at RM2,010 and he was willing to give me a 15% discount due to my repeated purchases. To say that I was not tempted at all would be giving the bulls.

I had a thought about having both pieces and then transplanting the red minute hand into the Turtle Pepsi so that it looked like the PADI version. Hmmm, worth a shot?

Tudor Heritage Advisor & Tudor Pelagos Blue

My missus wanted to have roast duck today, so the whole family went to Village Roast Duck at a shopping mall in Klang Valley, for lunch today. It was a good lunch; but would have been better if the attending waitress was less of an actress. Imagined, there were 5 of us seated at the table and we ordered a fair bit of dishes that would have made waiting our table a profitable one for the restaurant. They served 4 bowls of complimentary soup (every client gets it); and I asked that my maid be entitled to a bowl too and the waitress put on a long face at my request. 

I mean, if I could be seated at the same table with my maid and ordered nice dishes that she could share with us and eat together, does that not meant that she was part of the family and should be treated equally? There's something wrong with the social fabric if the propaganda by government and some quarters had turned us into racist bigots. Give me back the old Malaysia when all races and nationalities could integrate so well together, and or currency was still respected and held in awe by money exchange traders overseas. But I digress...

Anyway, after lunch, we had a walkabout and I went into some watch shops that I have frequented previously. One of the managers told me that business had been very slow (and weekends were the times when they net the real sales) and offered me 15% off the Tudor range. Now, that was a pretty decent offer and I took a look at the Tudor Heritage Advisor (RRP : RM22,000), which was reduced to RM18,700. Interesting mechanical alarm clock on wrist, I would say.

They also had the Tudor Pelagos Blue and Black, at RRP : RM16,800. Readers would know that I have a soft spot for the Pelagos, especially so after I have sold off my Pelagos 2-liner. The manager informed that the Pelagos was the best-selling watches in their shop and that they could only extend 10% for the model, and for today only as a one-off offer. Still a good price nonetheless, given that some places only allocate between 0-5% for the Pelagos. At RM15,120, that would meant getting the new Pelagos at the old Pelagos' price. I was rather tempted, and I further know that Pelagos could be easily flipped off at the end of the day if I decided to off-set the piece. However, having it on my wrist and seeing the busy and cluttered 5-liners, I had to turn away and decline the offer. Rolex has some of the best dials in its diver range; so why can't they do the same for Pelagos? A simple 2-liner like previously, and in blue, would have made it pretty desirable and buyable. Why oh why do you make it so complicated, Rolex/Tudor?

Exclusive : Ball Engineer ii Genesis 125th Anniversary Limited Edition - First Real World Pictures @ Malaysia

Ever since I wrote about the pre-order for Ball Engineer ii Genesis 125th Anniv LE back in December 2015, I have received an average of 2.5 e-mail queries per month on the said watch. And each time, I sent back a standard reply that I have not received the watch as yet and could not comment on the real world review as requested.

Well, more than 4 months have passed since my order and voila, I received an e-mail 2 weeks back that my watch was had been shipped to Malaysia and was pending the custom clearance. Yeah, ever since the GST was imposed, it had been a tedious exercise purchasing goods from abroad. I used to buy watches from overseas due to better prices and as watches were tax-exempted prior to the GST implementation, it was easy to buy, write my review, then flip the watch off before the next arrival. But it's no longer as easy these days and it was very much a hassle if one gets called to KLIA for the GST payment and clearance.

Ball SC's interior design was akin to 50 Shades of Red. 

Need a Security Pass to go in.

Anyway, that was how I found myself sitting patiently at the waiting lounge of Ball Service Centre Malaysia, while the customer service representatives prepared the watch for me. It was quite a wait actually, and there were more and more customers coming in for their watch collections. We were said to be amongst the first batch in Malaysia to receive the Genesis. Chatting with the CSRs, I gathered that the most popular combination in Malaysia was 43-Blue-Bracelet, which was the exact combination that I pre-ordered. Looks like I am a Malaysian through and through.

Package retrieved and pending the journey home.

After lunch, I began to explore the package that Ball SC had passed to me earlier.  The box was different compared to the other 2 Ball (Hydrocarbon and Fireman) watches' generic boxes that I had. Not sure if this box was specially for the 125th anniversary or if all new Ball watches now came with this drawer-like box.

The watch by itself had quite a presence. The numerals were huge, and the micro gas tubes were 1mm thick (!); which should shine like torches in the dark. I would know later the night. Plenty of polished surfaces on this watch, and it was pretty bling-bling. With the 40mm, it would have made a nice dress watch, I believed; although the dial was too sporty to be a dress watch. In a way, you could say that it was neither here nor there. It's not a real diver's watch (although Ablogtowatch referred to it as one) as it had no unidirectional bezel and WR was only 100m. It's not a real dress watch as it was just sized too big to be one, and those large numerals were more akin to pilot watches. Yet, it's not a pilot watch as it clearly lacked the huge onion crown for easy access while with gloves. So I guess it was really a scientist or engineer's watch (like the Milgauss) since it was sporty but elegant, and had shock resistance up to 5,000Gs and anti-magnetic protection up to 4,800A/m.

The blue dial was a really nice shade of blue. It looked like black in darker areas, and would changed into a darker shade of blue against the light. I have had other blue dial watches, but not this shade of blue; so I considered the tinge of blue to be rather unique and attractive. The classic colour ensured a sense of evergreen classiness, so you could wear this watch as a daily-beater should you choose so.

The caseback had really excellent engravings depicting Ball's 125th anniversary of railway history, and was amongst the most beautiful caseback that I had seen. And Ball had engraved my name between "Swiss Made" and the serial no. as part of the pre-order special; and the engraving was smooth to the touch and lined up perfectly with the rest of the engravings. According to the CSRs, the engravings were made at Ball's Swiss plant and quality control was highly-controlled there. Add to the fact that this was the first watch where Ball engraved the owners' names on the casebacks, and it was altogether a rather nice gesture.

The bracelet was pretty comfortable, and even my missus agreed so. It had full and half-link adjustments, so one could have the bracelet adjusted nicely to one's wrists. The clasps were the butterfly type, which depicted a sporty-elegance there.

This particular combination i.e. 43mm blue dial with bracelet, was already out of stock worldwide although other combinations were still available in limited numbers. Truly a nice watch to add up to one's collection!

Hamilton Pan-Europ Chrono at RM3,040?!

I had some time to kill while waiting for my flight so I went to look at watches around the airport. The salesperson recognised me and informed me that they were doing a clearance sale on Hamilton this week. 

"Do you have Pan-Europ Chrono, mbak?", I asked. 

She replied in the affirmative and showed me these 2 pieces, at 40% sale from the RRP. After conversion, the price went from RM7,600 to RM3,040 per piece!

I knew a good deal when I saw one, so I informed her that I would take 2 pieces each. I know fellow collectors back home whom would take these off my hand easily, with a small profit my way even.

But alas, at the counter, her colleague informed her that the "4" on the tag denoted "April stock", not "40% discount". The manager came forward to apologise and offered me a 20% discount, which I politely declined.