An Appreciation of Things Old

Earlier this week, I had a conversation with a colleague about the appreciation of beauty, quality and old things. She was remarking how one of the shortcomings of our society is our fetish-like obsession with new things.  An obsession that can harbor on lunacy at times. With the exception of a few more eccentric ones, we seem to have very little appreciation for things old. We seem to think old equals broken. With the way things are constructed  in our throw-away culture these today however, this way of thinking does not seem all that wrong sometimes.

Strangely coincidentally, that week was inundated with encounters with old things. A pleasant week.

Firstly, a friend of mine gave me an old pen. It was one of those pens that he gave out to clients as part of the promotional activities decades ago when he was in sales and merchandising. I think he was doing some pre-Chinese New Year cleaning when he came across the pen. So he gave it to me which I appreciate very much. It was a rollerball pen but it has been dormant for more than a decade so the ink had dried out.

A few days later, I took a drive to K.S Gills to get a new refill. I think anyone who grew up in KL or anywhere near KL would know about KS Gills: it’s the ultimate pen and writing tools heaven in the country. The moment you get into that shop, your mind boggles at how many kinds of pens there are in the world, or at least in that shop. I get a kick each time I go to that shop. Anyway, I digress.

They could not find a Sheaffer refill that could fit the pen. I guess, Sheaffer stopped making that models years ago. So, while they searched for a refill that could fit my pen, I had a look around. That was when I saw a pen that I had not seen for ages. It was a The Faber-Castell E-motion ballpoint pen. I remember seeing this make and model of pens, ballpoint pens and pencils years ago. I like the design but it cost more that I could afford to pay for a pen back then. Now, there were these ballpoint pens on display with “50% off”.  I immediately asked to look at the collection; there were eight of them in the display case. The assistant tried to get me to look at other pens in the next display because he said the pens that I wanted to see have been there so long that they have gone sticky. I think it has something to do with the plastic or whatever material used to make them. I insisted on seeing them and true enough, they had all gone sticky: all except one. I picked it up, tested it and it worked fine. So I took it. Apparently, when it’s the only one left still working it costs even less. The shop owner got it cleaned for me and replaced the refill.

By that time, they found that both pens could take ballpoint refill in the Parker standard refill format which made life a lot easier. So I walked out of the shop with two working pens that the shopkeeper described as collectors’ items.

Yesterday, I made another delightful discovery. I learnt that the Kawada building blocks still exist. When I was small, some Japanese colleague of my father’s gave me a Kawada building blocks set. It was probably the one toy that affected my entire childhood and later life. I spent whole days building things out of the blocks. Yesterday, I learn that they still Kawada still make these blocks but they have gone nano (NanoBlock by Kawada). I think they must have had problems with Lego because of the size. I haven’t gotten a set yet but who knows, still dwelling on it.

The days before, I was walking to my building when I saw a new neighbor arrive in a Lambretta scooter. I thought, WOW! I haven’t seen a Lambretta in a decades. Then as I walked closer to I realized that it was not a Lambretta. It was a brand new scooter, I think its Chinese made but I could be wrong. The shape however is a definite copy of the Lambretta scooter of the sixties and seventies.  

Lesson learnt:

1.       Some old things were actually made to last

2.       Not all old things last

3.       Some new things look like old things

4.       Some new things are made to look like old things probably because they had nice designs back then.