Chinese Branch Time

October 19, 2006 12:54 AM

I want a Chinese wristwatch.

Take a look at this.

I want one.

It combines the normal Chinese numbers 1-12 along with their alternate time-style (expressed in 2-hour chunks):

1. 子 / zi3 / 1st earthly branch / 11 p.m.-1 a.m.
2. 丑 / chou3 / 2nd earthly branch / 1-3 a.m.
3. 寅 / yin2 / 3rd earthly branch / 3-5 a.m.
4. 卯 / mao3 / 4th earthly branch / 5-7 a.m.
5. 辰 / chen2 / 5th earthly branch / 7-9 a.m.
6. 巳 / si4 / 6th earthly branch / 9-11 a.m.
7. 午 / wu3 / 7th earthly branch / 11 a.m.-1 p.m.
8. 未 / wei4 / 8th earthly branch / 1-3 p.m.
9. 申 / shen1 / 9th earthly branch / 3-5 p.m.
10. 酉 / you3 / 10th earthly branch / 5-7 p.m.
11. 戌 / xu1 / 11th earthly branch / 7-9 p.m.
12. 亥 / hai4 / 12th earthly branch / 9-11 p.m.

Googling: CHINESE WATCH (or WRISTWATCH) mocks me, since it seems that the vast majority of normal watches are made in China. Thus, I get a bazillion useless hits.

posted by RavinDave to shopping (5 comments total)

Google mocked me too. I tried the name of the timepiece - Walensa? - but got nothing.

You could contact the person whose flickr account it is and ask, maybe?
posted by t0astie at 1:18 AM on October 19, 2006

Yeah ... that'll be "plan B". Appreciate the effort though, t0astie.
posted by RavinDave at 1:20 AM on October 19, 2006

There are several on ebay. here's one, for example.
posted by helios at 1:27 AM on October 19, 2006

Wow! What the heck did you use for keywords, helios? I SWEAR I checked ebay for about a half hour, and all I found was a waving Mao watch and some cartoon character.

Fantastic!
posted by RavinDave at 1:30 AM on October 19, 2006

I searched for "chinese watch" (without the quotes) and the results were full of pocket watches, so I tried "chinese watch -pocket" (w/o quotes) and that put them on the first page of results. Although it looks like you could narrow it down even further by adding -copper -red -mao, etc.

By the way, here is the exact watch from the flickr photo.
posted by helios at 3:31 AM on October 19, 2006