When my dad first bought me a Swiss Army watch as a kid, I thought it was the coolest thing ever. Being able to accurately tell time was like being able to accurately find your way somewhere – something that you learn to do as you get older, a symbol of adulthood and self-sufficiency. My old standby watch was always a couple minutes fast or slow. It would not really stay on time for more than a couple days. Early digital watch technology was cheap, but not always good. A high quality watch was something to be prized.
It is funny how quickly things change. Now even the world watch is a little bit outdated and quaint. World watches, after all, aren't really needed anymore. Everyone has computers, and those computers are set to the international atomic clock. Stop and think about that for a second. Your average run-of-the-mill personal computer is more or less as accurate as the most accurate clocks in the world at any given moment. It is no wonder that you see fewer and fewer wristwatches.
Still, as a frequent traveler, I find that my world watch comes in handy quite often. I can't figure out why, but for some reason I always get disoriented on flights. I am zoning in and out, dozing off and waking up, restlessly moving around to try to soothe my aching back. With all of that distraction, I can't remember what time my wrist watch has. Is it set to the arriving time or the departing time? How much time has passed, and how much time is left? Until I got my world watch, I could never answer any of these questions. Now I know the time in any time zone around the world. I don't have to worry about resetting my clock. As a matter of fact, it is a luxury watch which means I don't have to worry about resetting it ever. It is every bit as accurate as my computer, automatically synchronizing to international time standards.
For such a luxurious timepiece, the world watch had a rather humble origin. I actually bought it at an online site called world of watches, or something like that. I got a big discounts, and I was able to find a style that I hadn't been able to dig up in any of the stores around here. I have been wearing it for years now, and it still keeps perfect time.
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