Watch out

I was feeling rich and there are two things that I have always secretly always loved possessing. One is shoes and the other is watches. I can still think about shoes as a functional thing and expensive shoes tend to be better lasting and comfortable compared to cheaper versions. Of course there is a limit to this pay off. I am at around 4 to 5 thousand beyond which I think the shoes start on their downward marginal utility of the money spent. The problem is that the world has moved to around 6 to 7 thousand or even 8 thousand before the shoes start making awesomeness. Apparently I have not kept pace with the shoes innovation inflation index yet. This is in the sports shoes index.

Luckily in the formal space index, shoes have largely stayed within my range. And at this time I am super lucky as one day I walked into the Cole Haan shoe shop seeing a 60% sale board. These were ridiculously expensive shoes. In INR they were at 15 to 18k for a pair of shoes. No way would I even smell them at that price. So luckily at 60 /65 % off they were with reach. Just a bit more expensive than normal but still within reach. So I bought one pair. After a few months, this shop was going out of business (obviously) and they had a 70% off sale. Jasmine egged me on and I bought two more pairs within my range and now I am complete. Three leather pairs and one old trusty pair. Done. These should last me at least 3 to 4 years. Hopefully more.

On the sports shoes, I was heavily influenced by the book “born to run”. There the author argued that humans are designed to run bare foot and the shoes with cushioning have spoilt our gait and running style. Thanks to the cushioning we have on our shoes, we have learnt to hit heel first versus a more mid foot impact style that barefoot runners have. I was so heavily influenced by this that I bought a lot of sport shoes with a thin sole and zero drop. I think today that it was a mistake. It’s not the best thing to do for my feet. Possibly I am too used to cushioning or my feet run in a different way and to retrain the old ancestral style would take too much effort and is probably useful for those running marathon, not couch surfers like me. But still – 4 K is my limit and I have to really wait for sales and clearances before I can buy anything.

But for now – I have enough sport shoes, chappals, leather shoes and sandals. More than what I need. No more testing the level of my passion of collecting shoes.

As for watches, I have a genuine problem. I love these watches but have complete understanding that there is ZERO marginal utility on an awesome watch versus a really cheap watch. Long time back, I think 7 years ago I was feeling pretty rich and I ventured to buy a watch. I bought a Victorinox watch on sale. One of my friends worked there and hence I got an employee sale price on the watch. The watch originally was for 26,000 and I was getting it for 16,000. A steal and I bought it. It’s a great watch and I love it, but after that purchase I understood that I have too much spare money and we decided to buy a house – our current house, and we got screwed in deb for the next 4/5 years. I haven’t bought a watch after that. I have been looking at watches, ogling at them, especially the automatic ones but could never justify to myself buying one.

Recently on a business trip abroad, while at the Duty free my CEO was looking at an Omega watch he liked. He bargained, got a good deal and bought a watch costing more than 300,000. That’s cool. He knows his watches and he knows what’s cool in the high range section. He bought it and looked at me. I smiled. He told me “you are that types – a three hundred thousand watch will also tell the time and a 300 buck watch will also tell the time, nah?”. Hahahah. Ya, kind of.

So recently I again started looking around and a mailer from my airline frequent flier program told me that I could redeem my miles for an awesome Casio watch costing around 6,000. Sure.

I started searching for reviews and views online, when my eyes fell on this beauty. This particular one called Casio F91W. Wow this was so retro it was cool. It reminded me of the watches I had in school and while growing up. Of course it released only in 1991 when I was firmly out of school but the design principal of the watch was very clear. It was that 80’s watch. Cheap fibre and a work horse. I researched some more and I realized that this one was a crazy seller and still sells high numbers. It’s cheap and the battery lasts between 7 to 10 years. And it reminded me of my childhood and my dad. Funnily enough that’s what the reviews also said.

I love it and ordered it online. 725 bucks and next day delivery. Am I proud or am I proud?

This has also been dubbed the most dangerous watch in the world. Its great use has been in being used as a detonation timer for bombs. Osama bin laden was spotted wearing it in one of his videos and it was also used to profile terrorists by the US for detention. Serious! What a story. Now this watch is no ordinary watch. It is The Watch. I am suddenly prouder.

Some guys in office wonder what a guy like me is doing with a watch like this. Ah – you know…..

Uplift from lower echelons

“What Jasmine, you are so middle class! You thought something happened with the watch just because the seconds hand was jumping every five seconds on my Victorinow watch.”

Victorinox is the most expensive watch I have with me. I am not such a watch guy and more so I hate spending too much money. I have three watches which I wear regularly. First one – Casio. Sports watch – analog plus digital. It’s a light steel one which is water resistant. It’s got an alarm and a stop watch and two time zones. I use this on Saturday and Sunday and especially while travelling. It’s really a nice rugged watch. This one cost me around three thousand bucks.

Here you see it -its really scratched and well worn. I have a special place for this one in my heart

The second one – it’s a Titan Xylus. This is a Chrono but I don’t know how to use it. It looks big and expensive and ‘Swiss’. The titan guys went out of their way to make it a Swiss watch. They even set up a plant or something like that in Swiss so that it could be correctly called a Swiss watch. There is a story to this watch. I normally take time with my expensive purchases. Do my research. Look at it and then come back and then see it again and think through. This has helped me well. Many times I have ended up not buying thanks to my inactivity and normally I don’t seem to have lost much. Of course when you have Jasmine on your side, this becomes a bit of a pain. She gets after your brains. She keeps saying – buy it. It’s ok. Buy it. It’s ok. This gets into me and I end up buying it. This time I was looking around, shopping for a watch since some time. I kept seeing many watches. I remember I wanted a sapphire glass crystal surface so that it is scratch free (that’s what I think it’s called). And then I wanted it to look big and good. But the prices were mind numbing. Any decent good looking watch would be in the 15 to 20 thousand range. It was then that I chanced upon this watch. It was their cheapest chrono and it was around 10 or 11 thousand bucks and with a scratch proof lens. And they were giving away a stupid Nokia phone worth 4 thousand free with it. Great the next day I decided to buy it. My mom heard of it and said she wanted to gift me something and this was the perfect gift. It was something I wanted and I would wear so please buy the watch as a gift from me. So Ankit and I went to buy this watch. We bought it and got the stupid phone free. We then immediately set off trying to search for a buyer for the cell phone. I didn’t bother on the street price or anything. I flatly gave a discount on it. We went from shop to shop till we got one shop with a guy who trusted us and wanted a cell phone. Deal done. The guys at his shop were wondering what kind of watch would I have bought to get a cell phone free. WTF!

And of course my favorite one – the Victorinox. There is something I like about it. The rugged simplicity and dark green dial.

One of my students was working at Victorinox and he was generally in touch. He told me there was a sale internally and the watches were at 30 to 50% off. It was the time when I was relatively richer. I hadn’t bought the second house and so I was awash with cash and reasonably high bonuses. Sure. Send me the pictures I told him. This one caught my eye as a simple one with a military kind of air about it. Original price 26,000, sale price – 16,000. Wow. That’s expensive, but my mind was set and I loved the look and blah blah…. I bought it. I still wonder how I paid so much for this watch. But I guess it has paid off in some way. Metal straps don’t wear off like leather and its water resistant – so I can swim with it and ITS REALLY SWISS! Ha ha. Like I bloody care. But you know – everybody seems to care what brand you wear.

The other day one of team member told me that me – as the head of marketing cannot wear a ‘Casio’. Oh shut up. What the F? You wear what is best for you. And what’s wrong with Casio? That shit also costs three grand. It’s not like I am wearing some cheap plastic Chinese brand. And this head of marketing drives a hatch back right? To which the retort always is – that’s ok because you have a sedan which your wife drives. Ooooo

So coming back to the Victorinox. A few weeks back somebody noticed that the watch was jumping every five seconds. It’s told the time just fine – the seconds hand jumped every five seconds and made up for the time. Dam. Iw as pretty stressed out. This expensive watch jumping every five seconds. What was wrong with it? I hunted for the warranty card and sent the peon to the showroom to get it fixed. He called back and put me on line with the technician. He told me – “sir, we need to change the battery”. “Why is that” I asked. “It’s jumping five seconds, not stopped.”. “yes sir. That’s the thing with Swiss watches. They jump five seconds to indicate to you that the battery is losing power.”. oh ok. “how much is the battery for? 300 bucks? Wow. Aren’t batteries available for like 60 to 100 bucks?” by this time I was sure the other guy thought I wasn’t fit enough to wear, let alone buy a Swiss watch. “sir. All Swiss watches have this one brand of batteries that they authorize”. Oh ok. Not wanting to let myself stoop further, I only inquired on how long they last and quickly agreed to change batteries and hung up. They last for around 18 months and above. Great.

So now Jasmine knows what Swiss watches do to indicate that the battery power is wearing off. How cheap is that. Thinking that watch is wrong when all it was, was a superior design that ensured you got an early warning before you ended up in the middle of the day with a dead watch. Real cheap of us.