Getting myself an automatic watch for the first time- here is how my experience went by

How I started my Journey towards watches and experienced a tinge of mechanical watches 

Owning a mechanical watch is not just another product inyour closet, but it can be an asset class product, which can be additive to its collectors.

Representative Sketching of Citizen Mechanical Watch

I have been fascinated by watches since my childhood. I remember fighting with my cousin to get a red acent variant of a first copy Casio F-91w watch, unknowing of a fact that it is a cheaper copy and not original, such were my intial interaction with watches. It was during my class 10, where i was really looking to own a really good watch for my self. i was confused between selecting a digital or a quartz watch. My classroom was filled equally with wrists doning digital watches, quartz watches, and no accessories at all. I was mesmerized with the looks of Casio A158WA-1 (brought by their fathers, who were working in Gulf countries), partially due to my childhood memory of F91w kicking in, and partially due to the looks it provides for a dark skinned person. Equally i was taken aback by the looks of classy quartz watches both in steel and leather straps from brands like Fastrack and Sonata. Been confused with all these, i straight up went to my father, asking him to buy me a watch. I was expecting a standard one like quartz dial loaded inside a resin case with silicone strap (which was a fashion thing in 2010s among IInd tier town school boys in Tamil nadu), which might take atleast 2 or 3 days, to find time inbetween to take me to a shop and buy me one. To my surprise, he immediately turned towards his closet locker and came back with a watch, a vintage citizen (which looked like this), a thing that my gradfather had given him during his college. I was not keen obviously,  as i was expecting a brand new watch instead of an old relic, unkowing about its worth/quality/working mechanism or anything. i was boggled about the idea that when whole of my class is enjoying the fun of digital watches or stylish quartzs, I'm going to wear a older watch. I also noticed one more thing, that was the seconds hand rotating continously instead of a step  movement. Since, the watch was given a life after so many years from a closet, and starting it without a proper manual winding, but ran off a slight movement it recieved from those movements from closet to my hands, it went ahead to stop within an hour or so. I got panicked on seeing a watch going on literally a sleep mode. My father then told me about the automatic movement powering the mechanical watch. so if I need it to run for several hours, then i need to provide it a manual winding so that it can have a good tension to keep it awake for several hours.

I donned the watch for a complete one year, with its hands, straps replaced to get it to a minimal look of my likedness. Still unknowing of its worth and beauty, i wanted to shed this relic to cherish a newer qaurtz, where i bought this Titan's Karishma brand watch (which I hold on to this date). it endured lot of bruises, damaged top glass, kept on running for more than 14 years (My father gifted it to me in June, 2011) undergoing battery swap only twice.

Titan Karishma (NT9151SM01) Quartz Analog with Date White Dial Stainless Steel Strap Watch for Men

I went on to add few more watches (all are bought except one which came as a gift) Titan Workwear (NT1698KM01) Quartz watch, Fastrack (NS3039SP02) Quartz watch, a Honor Band 4, and an  Amazefit Bip 3 Pro.

Titan Workwear (NT1698KM01) Quartz Multifunction Brown Dial Stainless Steel Strap watch

Over the years of owning multiple watches, interacting with it, i started appreciating automatic mechanical watches. This is the moment I felt bad for not maintaining the Citizen watch given by my dad. It was again sleeping in my father's closet. By this time,  I had moved to different city, which didn't allow me to take the citizen for a fresh start. I went back home during vacation, only to realize, i had grown,  unable to fit that watch in my hand. I thought of buying some other watches, rather than repairing it and altering with newer dial, bigger strap and destrouing its somewhat maintianed originality.

Fastrack (NS3039SP02) Quartz Analog Brown Dial Plastic Strap Watch

I was eagerly looking forward for deals to get automatic mechanical, but only to realize, that both the automatic and manual hand-wound automatic watches were always outside my budget. At one point in time, I had made up my mind to leave the mechanical watches for a future buy, and settle for a quartz once a year. When i was sorting through various e-commerce sites, i had sortlisted quite a few quartz from Sonata (1, 2, 3), HMT (1), Timex (1, 2, 3, 4) meanwhile scraping through their mechanical watch collections (1, 2. 3. 4. 5) which would either be multiple grands higher than my budget or does not have a good design.

A month ago, I was so much motivated to get the automatic watch and stop piling up quartz in my cart list, I was looking for other sources, where i can get a genuine mechanical (both manual hand-wound and automatic movements) watches from old refurb markets. Most of the sources were i could manage to fit in the budget werte either bogus, or refurbished to lose its originality. hence, i was made to look into the market for fresh piece. to my luck, with the sales announced for Independance day of India, i was able to manage a deal that effectively alleviated 40% of its cost, i managed to buy it before it goes out of stock. It is a Timex (TWEG208SMU04) Automatic Silver Dial Mechanical Watch.

TIMEX (TWEG208SMU04) Automatic Silver Dial Analog Watch - For Men

I bought the watch in the deal for around INR 6,000/-, while original box price was mentioned around INR 10,500/- (during writing this post, it was priced roughly around INR 6,500 - 7,000 in Amazon India website). I'm amazed by the quality of the watch, which I did not expected it to be powered by Miyota 21-jewel automatic movement.

Specifications

• Case width: 44 mm
• Movement: Miyota 21-jewel automatic
• Strap: Stainless Steel
• Dial Color: Half-Skeleton White

I knew this model is not a retail one that is available in the official timex sites, as it is made specially for e-com sites. I went on to buy this model out of eagerness to own an automatic mechanical watch, coupled with budgetary cosideration. It is still a better watch for starting one's mechanical watch collections. I have decided to wait for some time, enjoy this watch and later hop on to buy my next mechanical watch from Vostok, a Russian brand that has a huge collection of automatic and manual winding watches in its portfolio, powered by both its own movement and japanese movements (Miyota).

Share your watch collections, your wishlist collections, favourite brands & movements, designs, your opinion on BYOW (Build Your Own Watch) movement that is happening owing to availability of cost-effective parts online.