In 1988 when I finished my A-Class I purshased myself a Breitling Chronomatic. At this point Breitling only had three models: all the same Chr0nomatics, one in SS one in bicolor one in full gold version. They just came up from a nearly bankrupt time and so the SS watch was pretty cheap at 2000 German Marks = 1000 Euro = 1300 USD. I purshased this watch as a sort of a memory regarding my father who died in 1978 with a breitling at his wrist.

Worn the watch over 5 years I gave it to my mother and she placed it in our bankers safe.

10 years later I asked her to pull it out from bank and bring it to me to my birthday. She brought the watch at here home but I forgot to take the watch with me and as she is 300 miles away I thought : OK I will pick it up next time.

However when I asked her to send the the watch to me, the watch was disapperead. We both runned into a huge discussion, but the watch was mysterically gone.

About 2 years later the cellars of the house where my mother is living was broken open and everything was gone. The stole what ever things from ALL cellars in the house. During the police interview my mother mentioned the mysterical disappearance of the Breitling Chrono. The police officer said, that they think a couple moved 5 years into the house was responsible for the cellar thing: as they found fingerprints at each cabin. Police officer went to these guys and just mentioned the breitling story 2 years back.

3 days later my mother opened the post box and the plain watch was in there...full bracelet length 8.5 inch included, which surprised me as this huge wrist is not very common... and when somebody keep a stolen watch for more than 2 years you could think he wears the watch - or not?

So what happened: two yeas ago my mother gave the key to thes brave couple for taking care of the garden and flowers....and they stole the watch...the left all the jewlery behind: just the mens watch they stole.

Now the watch is in my own bankers safe. I never thought to get it back after it was gone...Interestingly the same model is now worth 6500 euro = 8000 USd.

I defenitley dont care about the money. I keep it as it is a good story and also an extremely good memory related to my father

Alex