You be the judge..

Love is in the air!

Seriously, I love reading this forum! Not long ago I wouldn’t have imagined the amount of effort, money, time and most importantly love people can put into tiny little mechanical devices. And now I am reading latest threads here every day - watches are nice, but the stories and interactions are even more interesting.

The idea of a short trip to pickup a watch is nice! I guess it is also a story that you can tell when someone is recognizing your watch. Wear in good health!

Great story and well documented. I can see why you would want to pick it up. It is much safer than today's shipping.

So, Vietnamese Customs does not care and wants Money, when you arrive with Watch plus Box and Papers in your luggage ? No Tax ? Btw: the case is pretty good as well.

I was thinking about customs, but did not want to say it. I have a friend who bought a Rolex President in the Islands. He wore the watch back and shipped the box and paper work and got a visit from the US customs.

James fυcking Bond energy, love it!

Needs a watch, finds a watch, flies to retrieve watch, flies home... gets shit done.

When I moved from Germany to Australia, I had 87 very rare vintage watches with me in my carry on bag. No gold, all steel. Bought a 1 liter Bottle of Whisky duty free at the airport. And a box of 20 Cuban Cigars in Dubai. Went straight to the something to declare exit. Fortunately the bottle of whisky was in an half open bag and once that reached the customs agant to check, the bottle rolled out, broke and every customs agent fell over his feet to the smell of aged Scotch to express his condolences and wanted to help me to get a refund for their misfortune and a refund from the Government. They then schooled me, that on top of that rare Booze disaster, they had to charge me quite considerable Tobacco excise.... Profund apologies about that Government policy to milk Foreigners with tobacco import duties , I paid still smiling and willingly, assuring them no bad feelings because they all just did their job. When it came to the 87 watches, the Agent did ask about the value and gold . I had prepared a hand written list with all makers and labelled 50 % as not working and needed parts. Next to no value. Still the sheer amount made the Customs Lady unsure and she took my stuff and myself to the Supervisor. Which had a longer line of tired travellers in front of her station.... Short explanation, then questions why somebody would bring old , non functioning steel watches into Australia; answered that Down Under had still very skilled Watchmakers and the hope to get things fixed , followed by my value list and if 10% tax was due on my values, I insisted to fill out the correct Customs vintage Watch Form ( the Agent had never seen before ) for old 87 Steel watches to do the right thing and pay something ; she looked at me and said: Don't forget to claim the broken bottle of Scotch from our Government! We are very sorry.... By then, every Government employee present at Customs that day knew me as the poor Guy with the broken bottle of Scotch . And that was it. Great Country !

Buy the watch, wear it on your return trip, ship the box to a PO Box, ship the receipt in an envelope to another PO Box.

Done...