tagheuer-watchThat watch on the left, is a painful reminder of why I’ve sworn off expensive watches. In 2nd year high school you see, while practicing for my high school basketball team, my “Tag” got stolen.

The watch was bought by my dad in Hong Kong on a family trip to Hong Kong two weeks earlier. He was about to purchase an Elysee watch for myself (I know right, WTH is that), when I insisted on getting the Tag Heuer watch instead. Even though I wasn’t really into watches, I just felt like I wanted the silver Tag more. And though it was a little bit more insisted, my dad agreed.

Basketball practice usually lasted for 2 to 2 1/2 hours. I always dressed up near the restrooms, and there was a small (unguarded) area in the covered courts where me and my teammates would place our things.

On that specific day before practice, I carefully took off my watch and buried it under my books, notebooks, and other school stuff. I don’t usually put my valuables in the same place all the time, and I even had a separate bag for my basketball gear. Since I wasn’t driving yet, I also had the luxury of sleeping in the car after a tiring practice.

You can just imagine how many times I turned my bag inside out when I got home once I found out the watch was missing. It was even more difficult it was to tell my dad about what had happened (I ended up telling him at least  6 months after the watch was stolen).

Will I ever get one again? If I was financially capable now, I guess I would. I would get the exact same watch. But then again, I guess this was one of the turning points in my life that made me develop a “do I need this?” mentality before buying anything expensive.

No matter how deep those bag pockets are, you’ll never know when these things will just get, “snatched” away.

From Alvin Jimenez