I also made a Facebook page on Swatch collecting in the Philippines, hoping to touch base with local collectors if there are any. But, as I said prior, for now, I am limiting my Swatch collecting to commemorative watches. Items on my bucket list, to name a few, are the Ateneo Swatch, the Philippine Centennial Swatch designed by Jaime Zobel, the Year of the Horse Swatch (SUOZ169), The Legend of White Snake (SUOZ158), and the Goat's Keeper Watch (SUOZ189).
For Valentine's Day this year, Kim gifted me with Swatch's Lucky Monkey (SUOZ203), their watch commemorating 2016. the year of the Lucky Monkey.
The box is designed with ornamental mandalas made to resemble intricate paper cuttings, which is also continued and incorporated into the design of the watch.
The watch is a New Gent, so expect it to be a bit small for people with somewhat thick wrists like me, then again, its not as if I'll be wearing them - they're kept safely in storage. That doesn't mean, though that it's a ladies' watch. The design is quite unisex, and I've seen pictures in Instagram of men wearing this size also. And if it weren't a collectible as far as I'm concerned, I wouldn't mind wearing it on rotation with my other watches.
As early as the first weekend of January I had the opportunity of buying it already from Swatch in Glorietta, had I not been with my sister. She exclaimed that I was too old to be buying funky watches, so I refrained from purchasing it, and said to myself I'd buy it when I wasn't with her.
On subsequent mall trips, however, whenever I'd visit a Swatch store, they'd always tell me that they were sold out already. Glorietta, Greenbelt, Trinoma, Sta. Lucia, wherever I asked this watch wasn't available. I asked to be put on the waitlist in case more stocks were to be delivered, and I was getting desperate as the Chinese New Year was drawing nearer.
One afternoon, while I was longingly reading up on reviews about the watch, I received a call from the Swatch Trinoma informing me that one Lucky Monkey had arrived, and it had my name on it. I bravely drove with Kim through hellish rush hour traffic that Thursday evening, from Makati to Trinoma! The waiting and drive was well worth it, because, Kim bought it for me as a Valentine's Day gift!
Having purchased it in Trinoma, we also entered a raffle contest. One of the reasons why stocks of the watch easily ran out was because Trinoma purchased 20 watches to raffle off. We didn't win.
Going through my list of online selling sites to check on Swatches for sale, I already saw listings for the Great White Snake, the Goat's Keeper, and the Philippine Centennial Swatch. Refraining from making any purchases now because I just finished some car repairs and am looking into buying a 2nd car. So I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the sellers won't be able to find people purchasing these models any time soon. With the statistics on my Facebook page, though, I'm quite confident because there does not seem to be much Swatch collectors locally.
Happy Chinese New Year, and Happy Valentine's Day everyone!
