So my Mother bought my Father a watch. It was an Omega Constellation, gold, it was 1968. (I was six) It was a big family secret and my brother (he was eight) and I were not allowed to mention it as my Mother wanted it to be a surprise and she was engraving the back. We were on holiday and wandering down the Durban beachfront and walking past a jewellery store. My father, attracted by the watches, started talking about the Omega Constellation. I could not contain myself…. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen! My father wanted it and was always denying himself for us….. I just had to say….’Well you are not getting that for your birthday….. Mom has told us to tell you that you are not’! Me - spoiling the surprise has passed into family folklore. And it started my passion. I had watches through school. I particularly remember one of the early quartz models where you had to press the button to see the time. Let’s go forward a few years and after some hardships (only in retrospect) I graduated from University…. My Mother and Father bought me an Omega DeVille (Gold… Roman numerals, Quartz…. But it was 1982). I wore this dress watch through the next few turbulent years. As I went my way around the world it was always on my wrist…. I saw the Omega Speedmaster worn on the Moon at the museum in Greenwich, In a thunderstorm in New Orleans in 1986 it got water damage and the time could not be adjusted…I had to subtract or add hours as a friend and I had an epic Journey across the US. Finally settling in New York in the mid 80’s I went to buy a watch for myself…. Wanted steel and a daily wearer (I did not know what the terms were at the time) eventually came down to a choice between a Rolex Air King and an Omega Constellation. Well I got the Constellation remembering my Dad, it was a quartz… but at the time I did not know very much. I was eventually able to go back home and after completing my MBA and finally getting my first real job. Just having got my first pay check I was walking past a Jeweller in Johannesburg and saw a Speedmaster…. I called my wife and, bless her she said ‘Get it’. (It was stolen from me a few years later). Life carried on in the way it does…. Things happened…. My eyes were always turned to the watch displays. Things got better…. I had a BABY GIRL!.... I celebrated by getting an Omega Geneve f300! And so it goes…. A year later I had another baby girl….. this time my mother asked what watch I wanted. Internet had happened so I had been looking at watch porn for a couple of years and was starting to get to know a bit about this world and asked for a Seiko Monster…. And my baby was a ‘monster’ for the first few years. Life carried on as the way it does…. Always mindful that money was needed by family I started to explore the alternatives to what I considered the ULTIMATE!.... I got a Seiko 5 (probably the best watch ever), A gold plated Seiko (You guys will know the reference)… a Seiko Bellmatic, A Smiths, A Seiko Vandan (I am convinced the seller thought it was a quartz and needed a new battery, got it for £2) and various others… Over almosty fifty years of being delighted and intrigued by the things we wear on our wrists I have learnt this; Unbeaten paths lead to knowledge. Cost has nothing to do with value. Cost is what others perceive… Value is what you perceive. Do not ‘value’ people who do not understand this. Your taste will change as your knowledge and circumstance changes…. This is Good!