I think it was because as cellphones kept evolving, they eventually managed to displace the functions of the watch which was essentially to tell me the time and the date. And since we carry our cellphones every single second anyway. There was no compelling reason to keep on wearing watches except as a fashion accessory.
I also went on kind of a minimalist phase where I shunned anything not really essential in what I wore. I used to wear a necklace and a bracelet. But got rid of them the same time as I stopped wearing watches. I just didn't feel comfortable anymore with things dangling or attached to my body.
My last watch was a Tudor Submarine Something watch. It was actually quite expensive with a retail price close to 100k if I am not mistaken. When I decided to forgo watches, I gave it to my father in law as a gift. When my father in law passed away a couple of years ago, it was returned to me and I eventually sold it to a friend for around 40K. I realized eventually that this selling price was actually a bargain, as another friend who was into watches told me that the model that I had could have fetched a higher price even though it was second hand because it was considered a classic, blah blah blah.
Anyway, I never really felt that I got the raw end of the deal as the watch was quite old and wasn't in good shape with dings and scratches everywhere. So I was quite happy with the amount that I got considering that I had no use for it anyway.
Fast forward to today. And guess what? I am again wearing a watch. A few days ago, I just decided at the spur of the moment that I wanted to wear watches again. I have no idea where the urge came from. I don't know how it came about. I just woke up one day and thought to myself that I wanted to wear a watch.
And so after a little bit of looking around, I bought one. Are you curious to know what watch I got ? It's not a Rolex. It's not an Omega or a Breitling. It's not even a Tag or a Technomarine. My wife was shocked to see me wearing a Casio G-Shock. (pun on words deliberate).
It is the essential everyday watch. It was tough. It was water resistant to 200 meters. It runs on solar energy. It had different date formats, world time, alarm, stopwatch and a bunch of other features that I can use when I travel. I can drop it from a building or bang it against a wall. I can do all these things and it would keep on working. I can even tell the ambient temperature if I wanted to.
It is the ultimate anti-rolex. It was designed to work and last forever but it is relatively cheap. As I grow older, I realized that I don't really care about expensive brands anymore. It isn't even about saving money. I could have easily purchased a much more expensive watch. But it just didn't feel right.
In some ways, it is like a big fat middle finger to all the people who look at your watch and judge you for how expensive it is. The ultimate fuck you to the establishment. It was perfect. Well, perfectly geeky maybe. Heheh...
I can just imagine the jaws of my officemates dropping and their eyebrows raised when they see me wearing this watch. With their rolexes and omegas tucked neatly in their sleeves and then they'll see this big black chunky thing on my wrist. Classic.
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