Dunhill AD2000 Sterling Silver Pen

Those gen X kids who like me grew up in the 80's would be familiar with the motto Gaya, Mutu, Keunggulan. "Style, Quality, Excellence". Belonging to the brand Dunhill.

Back those days, cigarette brands would be attach to football, F1, etc. etc. etc. They were everywhere.

These cigarette brands would have a luxury arm making branded goods, always at a premium price.    

Alfred Dunhill, the founder was born on 30 September 1872. In 1893, Dunhill inherited his father's business and the rest we can say is history.

This I purchased in PenGallery thank's to wonderful marketing. It was strategically placed at the entrance and it caught my eye as I was leaving the permise. Wonderfully displayed in a transparent case. The shining torpedo shaped pen immediately caught my attention.

It is under the AD2000 sterling silver series. Most of them on the internet have clips. However this is the clipless version.

Here are some pictures. I hope you enjoy them. Beautiful in every way.

Under magnifying you can see many scratches testament to its age.

2 sides of the pen are flat. Testament as a roll stop as it does not have a clip. It does not align straight. It runs by a couple of mm.

The rest of the barrel is round and smooth.

Dismantled. All beautifully crafted and screws in smoothly.

This will be one of my treasured possessions.

A picture of Alfred Dunhill taken in 1893, quite a sophisticated and dashing man

Sailor Vestaere Takuya Leather Crafter Fountain Pen

This was one of my more recent purchase on 4 November 2023 at PenGallery. I was not sure about this pen as it did not pop out like the brilliant breathtaking Arco celluloid. But it was unique and I do love leather goods so it took some thought before deciding. 

The Sailor Vestaere was made in 2002. It is 21 years old. Older than my son. It is based on the Pro Gear 21K fountain pen and individually crafted and hand stitched by a Takuya Okamoto, a well known leather craftsman based in Tokyo. 

He is a highly sought after leather craftsman among Japanese pen collectors and leatherworks. He has gone to great lengths to conceal the secrets of his craft. His creations, which look so deceptively simple, belie much of the attention to detail and time spent to make them. 

Which is what attracted me to the pen n the first place. 

I am unable to share much details with you as to its performance as I had not used it since purchase. It has gone into storage. But users of Sailor fountain pens would be familiar in its writing performance.

Looks wise it is deceptively simple yet elegant. Holding the pen does takes a little getting used to as I am not used to holding leather as a writing tool.

Being clad in leather, it needs to be maintenance like leather goods. i.e. the occasional leather moisturiser.

Ok. The question. Why am I not using it? Why has it gone into storage.

Well the answer is a bit more complicated. Initially I was attracted to the pen due to the leather motif. But on 4 November 2023 whilst holding the pen and seeing my son mingle with the crowd at PenGallery getting more into fountain pens, I thought this would make a good Birthday gift for my son next year. This is provided that he likes it. He is at this phase in his age where is he is attracted to more colourful and brighter pen barrels.   

3 December 2023 Breakfast

Simple or not so simple breakfast today. Depends on how you construe it.

In an oven friendly bowl place 2 cups of chicken broth, 4 smashed slices of garlic, salt, pepper, Italian herbs and cayenne pepper with thin sliced potatoes. Sorry I am unable to provide the measurements as like Uncle Rogers said, Asians go by feel. 

Bake for 220 degrees celsius for 40 minutes. What you are going for is perfectly cooked potatoes infused with the broth and spices flavour and potatoes with a little crisp at the bottom of the pan. There should not be any broth left once the potatoes are baked. If there is still broth left, do as I do. Transfer to a cast iron pan, drizzle with olive oil and butter and cook. Drying out the remaining broth.

Serve with buttered bread, some sour cream, avocados and the potatoes. Enjoy.   

Japanese War Propaganda Poster

The Japanese Army invaded Malaya just after midnight on 8 December 1941 at Padang Pak Amat beach, Kota Bharu, Kelantan. Their ruthlessness, tyranny and pilferage of the countries natural resources lasted until the Japanese first garrison to surrender in Penang on 2 September 1945.

The currency adopted during that tenure was the Japanese Government issued Dollar or referred informally with contempt as the banana money because of the motif of the banana tree on the 10 dollar banknote. 

Internet, Facebook, X, television was not a form of mass communication back then. 

To get your message across a broad spectrum of society quickly and effectively, radio, leaflets or posters were used to spread messages.

The invading Japanese forces used slogans such as "Asia untuk orang Asia" (Asia for Asians) to garner support from the locals. The aim was to convince the local population that Japan was the actual saviours of Malaya while Britain was portrayed as an imperialist force that wished to exploit Malaya's resources. 

The propaganda posters utilised were to touch the sentiments of the locals by using colourful art depicting Japanese army as their saviour, spreading false news of the war, depicting how well locals would be treated as opposed to the previous occupying imperial forces. Whatever lies it takes to entice support.

Lithographs posters were commonly used during that time period. Colours used were vibrant, vivid, bright and evocative. I have one such poster in my collection.

I have with the aid of sifu Dickson Niew provided some details as to the translation as I am unable to read Mandarin.

As mentioned above. If you construe the colours look very vivid and unique unlike printed colours of today. The paper material is also different. Another indication compared to the many re-printed fakes of today are the condition is damaged and not perfect, indication of its age, wear and tear. Fakes today are in perfect condition.    

Depicted on the bottom left corner is the artist name.

Pacific Ocean War.

Printer. Copyright. Reserved.

US aircraft carrier was attacked by the Japanese. Suicide bombers.

During the landing of America's army on an island at South Pacific Ocean, there were attacked by Japanese war planes.

Painting of Second World War USA & Airforce vs Japanese.

Anyone who can share more light on this matter please do email me at s_surins@hotmail.com

Simple but delicious scramble egg breakfast

Sunday, 26 November 2023 simple Hearty breakfast.

Sourdough bread was bought from a local Bakery. This bread or ciabatta bread would be great. Toasting them would be great. 

The beef strips were purchased from the supermarket. Any good brand will have good cuts with a little fat. Just cook them with a little Oliver oil and season with black pepper, salt and smoked paprika. I used cast iron pan to get some crust on the meat. 

For the scramble egg, here is how i made it. Turn on your non stick pan to low heat and pour 4 table spoons extra virgin olive oil. In about 1 minute drop in 6 large eggs. Start stirring slowly whilst breaking the yoke. The key here is to stir gently and slowly. Take your time and not rush. When the egg starts to stick or harden at the bottom of the bottom of the pan, remove the pan from the heat whilst continuing to stir gently. The key here is to be gentle and low heat. Once the egg mixture starts to solidify, put in 4 table spoons of butter and stir gently. Remember, everytime the egg hardens or stick however slight at the bottom of the pan, immediately remove the pan from the heat. Use a soft silicone spatula for this scramble egg making. Not wooden or hard silicone or plastic spatula. 

When the egg mixture becomes more solidify, add in salt, freshly ground white pepper, freshly ground black peper and some italian herbs. That’s it. You’re done. For garnish add in some chives. 

Add in a little drizzle of extra virgin oilve oil and balsamic viniger for that extra tangy taste.

Note my scramble egg recipe is on the runny side. How the french make it any not hard or dry like the malaysian style. 

You may add avocado slices and roasted sunflower seeds for that added creaminess and crunch. Enjoy.

Pilot PeTiT 1 Fountain Pen

4 November 2023 my son and I celebrated fountain pen day @ PenGallery. 

We only went there to mainly purchase some basic items like the Visconti my pen system of our initials to replace the Visconti logo on the top finial of the cap. And maybe purchase some nice ink colors as they were having their lucky draw by spending a minimum of RM200.

How wrong I was, we ended up NOT purchasing any of what was planned. 

What did we purchase? One item was shared in the previous blog. The other i will share at a later blog.

What I would like to share in this post is the Pilot PeTiT 1 fountain pen. On Shopee the cheapest is about RM6.90. What can you expect from a fountain pen at that price? Crap and nothing much? IT SITS at the same price point or slightly more than some pilot or faber castell gel pens. I was not expecting much. I had tried in the past using some cheaper made fountain pens at RM300++ but all were regretable to say the least and my mind was made up. Cheap = Crap. So at RM6.90 this will be super crap?

How wrong I was and to my delight and utter surprise, it was Brilliant. Never in my wildest imagination did i expect something so cheap to be so good. The plastic made pen was sturdily built. The cap opens / close with a solid click sound. The cap post solidly also with a solid click. 

The steel nib writes wonderfully. Does not skip a beat no matter how fast i write or scribble. What else do you want! Any improvements or any suggestions for improvement to take it up a notch? None! It is that good in my opinion. 

The pen is so cheap and sturdy, i can take it anywhere without a care. The surprising thing is that now it is my go to pen that i use regularly on a daily basis and i get worried if i cannot find it. Amazing. When my more expensive pens i cannot find, i usually don’t bother much as i know it is somewhere in the house, i just need to look again. But if this Pilot goes missing, i look for it everywhere until it is found. Hard to believe but it is true. 

Oh! The best part. Not once since using the pen did i get ink on my fingers. I always get ink on my fingers When using other fountain pens. If not now then later. Just a matter of time. I have used this pen for 3 weeks now. Never once, ink on my fingers. Great. That alone tells you how good this pen is. For the deceptive size of the grip section my fingers should long ago slip and touched the nib section or a little of the feeder but no, it does not. The material in the plastic grip section is smooth but grippy enough. Wonderfully design.

The bonus factor is the transparent feed. So the feed would change color reflecting the color of the ink it is filled with. 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻.

I understand that this fountain pen has been around since 2014. And I’m only now discovering this. Available only in F nib. For a F nib, it is not scratchy at all. 

I have not converted it into an eyedroper but will do so in the near future, once the ink cartridge finishes. 

This is One of the many free gift we receive from Pengallery for attending the event. Pictures below in the free goody bag. The Pilot FP, cartridge, Sharpie, postcards and t’ shirt.

In conclusion, this cheap pen has completely changed my mind about cheap pens and to give all pens a fair try before deciding. No more pens DISCRIMINATION. Try first. Then decide. 🤗

Opus 88 Mini Cheer Kitty 2023 Fountain Pen

It just dawn on me that I had not posted in more than a year. Oh my how fast time flies when you have so many things going on at the same time. The more reason for me to get more organised.  Well stay tuned as this is one a many articles coming.

Opus 88 2023 new year mini pocket fountain pen. These are special releases celebrating the arrival of 2023. Two designs were released, 2023 is the year of the rabbit so it was only fitting one would be a rabbit. The other would be a cat, welcoming celebrating the arrival of a new year full of love and adventure. 

I purchased the cat version @ pengallery on 4 November 2023 world fountain pen day. Why you ask? Because :

1. I thought it looked different, unique and cute. 

2. My daughter loves cats. 

3. It will be a beautiful birthday gift for her. She would not be expecting this. 

The cat was designed by Japanese artist (unable to find out who) and holds a red wine glass in the right hand whilst the left hand holds a wine bottle, whilst smiling with its eyes shut. (Reflecting the art of celebrating the new year). I guess it makes more sense and it’s more acceptable to have the eyes shut reflecting joy as opposed to have them open with a smile as if the cat is stalking you. Yikes!

This is my first purchase of Opus 88. I was never of fan of the make but a chance encounter with a geologist @ pengallery during inktober 2023 changed all that. She had a beautiful Opus 88 Fantasia pocket pen with a medium nib. It not only looked gorgeous but wrote beautifully. Silky smooth. I was impressed. 

They are eyedropper with a piston-style agitator. The demonstrator's pen body is a solid translucent color. 

The pen writes ok to me for a F steel nib. Nothing impressive. Unlike its looks. It’s looks fabulous. I guess I purchased it more based on the looks. 

My main peeve is that the pressure release valve is rather flimsy and feels cheep. You need to be gentle handling it. My daughter is 11 and rather rough so I need to warn her on this matter. I guess on more expensive Opus 88 models the release valve mechanism will be from higher grade plastic. 

I understand from online research that the Opus 88 Mini Pocket fountain pen was first released in November 2021 and one notable difference is that the pens now are able to securely post. Yayyyyyy! If you do some online searches they have some beautiful versions of this mini pocket fountain pens. These are some of my favorites. 

Mini Stripe 

Cup of Comfort 

Cinco de mayo 

Baby beluga

Year of the tiger

But after flimsy release valve on my cat version, I will give the above a skip. No matter how beautiful I think some of them are. I’m a firm believer of build to last concept. 

The Mini Rabbit pocket fountain pen on the other hand features a rabbit holding a fountain pen amidst a cascade of blooming flowers with a cursive, wrap around message on the barrel reading, "Happy new year 2023”. Although we love rabbits, I would not get it due to issue mentioned above. 

These are some of our pets, English Anggora (Fluffy and Trouble Maker) and Rex breeds (Blackie and Kangaroo). They all look a mess as they were out playing in the yard. Kangaroo’s fir looks off and pulled out as it is the mating time. 

Opus 88 is a company based in Taiwan founded in 1977 by Michael Hsu by doing oem works for other well known brands. But they begin producing pens in 1988. Hence the reference to 88. The founder referred the company’s design and manufacturing process is akin to a musical note so they settled on Opus, referring to the musical elements. A musical composition is referred to as Opus. On some of the Opus boxes there is the family name logo Hsu. Thanks to David Parker @ figboot on pens for this background history.