Bidding on a Janata
===================
Reading the ongoing thread between solderpunk[0] and Logout[1] about mechanical
watches (the HMT part specifically) triggered me badly.
You see, I already own a HMT Jawan (silver housing, black plate). I have it
since 2014 and I really like it because of its simplicity and reliability. It is
not as big and as fancy as most of the recently manufactured wristwatches, and I
also in love with it being a mechanical one. Winding it is kind of a ceremony
for me.
Strange thing is that prior buying it I wasn't really aware of Hindustan Machine
Tools in general. I was reading an article about the Ambassadors[2], the famous
cabs of India and soon found out than they were produced by a company called
Hindustan Motors. I don't actually remember how I ended up browsing HMT
wristwatches, but you know the internet, you just click and click and click and
you end up buying a vintage HMT Jawan, happened to all of us, right? Right?
Anyway.
Since then I've always planned getting another vintage HMT, a Pilot (it's
iconic), a Sona (the fancy one) or a Janata (which comes in many different
sub-models). The above mentioned thread made me speed up the process and kicked
me out of the planning phase into the doing phase. So I am now bidding on an HMT
Janata, it is most likely from the end of the '70s (probably 1978 or '79) and,
according to the seller, it is in perfect working condition. This one has a
white plate and a silver housing.
The best part is that instead of arabic numbers, it has *urdu* symbols, which
makes it a bit weird but also damn awesome, something you don't actually
encounter very often in the western world.
---
[0]
gopher://sdf.org:70/0/users/solderpunk/phlog/on-common-interests.txt
[1]
gopher://i-logout.cz:70/0/en/phlog/01-2018-phlog.txt
[2]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindustan_Ambassador
