Sheaffer Imperial TD and other recent acquisitions

From left to right: Hero 329, Sheaffer Imperial TD, Hero 849, Sheaffer No Nonsense
From bottom to top: Hero 329, Sheaffer Imperial TD, Hero 849, Sheaffer No Nonsense
From left to right: Sheaffer No Nonsense, Hero 329, Sheaffer Imperial TD, Hero 849
Jinhao FP (beautiful...no?)

Hi folks…

Last weekend was eventful…Hari was in Hyderabad for the weekend on official duty…and finally after a lot of hits and misses, we finally met on Saturday in my house for dinner…and as usual our talk centred around fountain pens…I showed him my FP collection…he was fascinated by the recently acquired Jinhao (I will post just one photo now)…he had promised to buy some pens for me and true to his word, he got 4 fountain pens…the most cherished one among the 4 is the Sheaffer Imperial TD…a dream pen for me…though it is a pre-owned one (otherwise, I wouldn’t have got it for the price I paid!!!), it is good enough for an impatient starter like me, who wants to have all well known (and affordable) brands in his collection as soon as possible…the pen has a 14 KT gold nib…the famous inlaid nib…I have started using it and it writes well and looks good in my shirt pocket…the other pen that Hari bought for me is the Hero 849 FP integrated nib…the body is of beautiful blue lacquer and the nib looks extremely unusual…I just want to say that the same pen is being sold in Hyderabad and the price mentioned by the retailer was 125% more than what Hari paid for the same pen in Bangalore…that is the problem with monopoly…so much for pricing and fleecing…Hari also got me two more pens…the Sheaffer No Nonsense FP and Hero 329 FP…this No Nonsense is of an unusual colour…some kind of a thick pink colour and opaque, unlike the earlier transparent No Nonsense that Hari got for me during his last visit…the Hero 329 is an old favourite…I like the cap, and I already had one, which is damaged, so I said ‘yes’ when Hari made the offer…

So…it has been a good weekend…my FP collection has grown…and thanks a lot to Hari for thinking of me when he was buying FPs and taking the trouble to go all the way to buy FPs for me…

Encountering Elmore...Finally...

Hi everybody...

Something or the other is always happening and sometimes one forgets them as soon as the events are over...now that I have started blogging...almost 5 months now...I look forward to 'post' points...I am sure many bloggers are always on the alert for 'post' points or have now learnt that anything can be a post...anyway...three days back, I had this great urge to buy at least one from the second hand bookwallah Al Classic near Sangeet...I went there and decided to look for a book by Elmore Leonard...Vinod always writes about this author and rates him highly for his readability and until I read Vinod's posts, I didn't know that this author existed...when we met briefly at Al Classic sometime last month, he pointed out an Elmore Leonard novel called Pronto to me...I thought I'd buy it later...now I decided to buy it and went there and found it in the same place in the same column of books...I picked it up and wandered around to see if I can find anything else...I found another Elmore Leonard novel called Rum Punch...I was tempted...I didn't know anything about this writer...only Vinod's word for his writing skill...I picked this novel up too thinking that if I find anything more familiar and unread, I will keep this one back...as I was moving away from this stack...guess what...I saw yet another Elmore Leonard novel called Killshot...this was unreal...by this time, I was totally bewildered... I had come for one Elmore Leonard novel and now I had three in my hands...but you can't do anything to a book-mad fellow...I decided to take all three...come what may...Vinod is there, no? but what if he has read them all? and I am sure he has already read all of them by now...Killshot is the slimmest of the three and I started with it...I completed the first chapter today morning...it reads well...I particularly liked the 'dry and bare' atmosphere created by the author...reminds of some American movies where you travel along long roads with no habitation on either side...and you hit upon a lone motel or a petrol station and you come across a monologue spitting type chap...and people talk more with their guns and pistols than with their eyes...so far so good...let me see how the book takes me further... will surely let you all know how the novels are...

Chinese Chakkar - Pendemonium

Hero Fountain Pens - Nibs close up
Hero FPs - Capped
Wing Sung FPs - Nibs close up
Wing Sung FPs - Capped

Hi everybody...

This happened almost a month ago…

I never thought I'd add Chinese Fountain Pens to my collection...but it so happened that I was kind of on the verge of being duped by an FP dealer who quoted an exorbitant variable rate on an FP that I had longed to buy...I did not buy it, not because I couldn't, but I strongly felt that this person was trying to con me and didn’t want to succumb...I was proved right when a fellow FP enthusiast and friend confirmed my suspicions...but I was angry and irritated at this and the next day, like a angry lover on a rebound, I went looking for this shop which stored Chinese FPs...I had visited this shop earlier, almost 2 years back, to buy an FP...I was not into collecting FPs then...I just wanted a nice looking FP...I found this very good looking metal screw cap big nibbed Hero FP and bought it...but that shopwallah also showed me the entire range of Chinese FPs that he had...I was not interested then and did not buy any more...but now that I had started collecting, I thought, why not...and went to this shop...the ownership of the shop had changed hands and another person was in charge...but they still had those Chinese FPs, not the entire range though...and I splurged...kind of retail therapy... (I added a couple of pens to that initial range...Hero 616 and Wing Sung 727 – double pen, purchased with Hari)... some of the Wing Sung FPs are really beautiful... I have dip tested all of them...and currently using 3 alternatively...all pens write well...at least that part is taken care of... here are the photos...and the names of these pens are...first Wing Sung-s...WS 727 double pen (the one in the centre); Wing Sung 608 Blue and Wing Sung 608 Brown (on either sides of the 727); Wing Sung 606 Brown and Wing Sung 606 Blue (on either ends); and Wing Sung 603 Black lines on Blue (the one that is horizontal); then Hero-s...Hero 616 (bluish green body with the arrow clip); Hero 330 (brown body with gold coloured cap); Hero 60 (light brownish coloured body with half nib); Hero 378 (steel cap with black body and big full Nib); Hero 27A (silver coloured body and cap with full nib); Hero 2C blue; Hero 2C gold...

A beautiful looking 14kt gold nib Jinhao has also been since added to the Chinese range…I tried taking photographs of the Jinhao yesterday, the results were not so good…will have to do it patiently…I will be getting 2 more Hero-s…Hari has bought an integrated nib Hero FP along with a Hero 329 FP for me in Bangalore…he will be coming to Hyderabad shortly…but, I have seen this integrated nib Hero FP and it is really interesting…wonder what they will come up with next…

Jai

Ad using Fountain Pens...aiyyam laiking eet...

Hi all...

I don’t know whether to call it an old fashioned ad…but the recent Vodafone ad really warmed my heart…in this age of roller ball and gel pens, it was surprising to see an ad using ink and fountain pens as its theme…that too school students using fountain pens!!! And it is so warmly shot…took me back to those school days back in Mangalore…some of us used fountain pens…the boy in the ad is shown using a Hero pen…and the girl has an eye dropper…and the way she draws in the ink drop to her pen by twisting the barrel was exactly how we used to do… and Hero was a very popular pen then…one, it was a foreign pen, and two, it had a filling system that did away with filling the barrel with the help of a dropper and the possible spilling, staining, etc… it was a common thing for us to help each other with ink drops to tide over urgent ink requirements, just like the boy in the ad helps the girl…Vodafone chaps have used this concept very well to sell the idea of ‘chota’ recharge…

I don’t remember any other ad that uses the ‘use’ part of fountain pens so well…It is a nostalgic ad and it brings a smile on my face every time I see it…I hope this ad promotes and provokes interest in fountain pens…or Vodafone chaps should offer a FP along with every mobile connection…ha ha ha…

see ya...

Jai