Saturday, August 14, 2010

Its back!!




Many years ago, an Italian guy had rented a small cottage that belonged to my grandfather. When the time came for him to go back to Italy, he ran short of cash to pay the rent for the past few months and asked my granddad if he'd accept his gold Omega (Cal. 320) watch instead. My grandfather initially declined telling him not to worry about the rent and to keep his watch, but the Italian requested him to take the watch as he didn't feel right about not paying, and eventually my grandfather had to accept it.
My grandfather then gave the watch to my dad, who wore it for a few year in college. It had then been sent in for servicing to a local watch maker (there was no Omega service centers here back then) who turned out to be not at all competent and messed up the movement. It stopped running and was put into a safe in the bank, forgotten over the years.
Last year, after me and Bio got into watches, my Dad remembered the watch and told us about it. We finally managed to persuade him to go back to our hometown and bring the watch to us so we could have a look at it. It was beautiful and didn't deserve to be lying unused in a safe.
I'm really pleased to say that Bio and I finally managed to get it serviced and cleaned up from a local watchmaker we discovered recently (Singapore Watch Repair). They have done a pretty neat job and brought life back into the vintage beauty. Since the original gold strap was now small for my dad's wrist, we replaced it with a dark brown leather band with a golden buckle.
My dad couldn't believe his eyes when he saw the watch - working again and back on his wrist after so many years. He had totally given up hope on it after that watchmaker ruined it. This is why you have to love mechanical watches!

3 comments:

Aditya said...

What an amazing watch! and a fantastic history to go with it!!! My brother (who lives in Bombay) had forwarded an SMS from the Singapore watch repair to me. Good to see that they did such a great job on your dad's watch.

Aditya

crazyfingers said...

Thanks Aditya! Yeah, the watchmaker did a pretty neat job on it, although he did remark that it was one of the most complicated movement he had serviced :D
Also, it saved me a LOT of cash getting it done from there!

Koimaster said...

Nice looking watch. it is too bad that the west has failed to embrace watches such as these. They are affordable, they work and they look good.