whats a computer to my grandma

My grandmother lived till she was 85 and sadly the last few years of her life were spent in darkness, as she turned blind at the age of 78, circa 1994.
The advent of the Internet and email and chat, had just begun in India. The dotcoms were growing by the dozen and every one had an email id to boot their postal address. Suddenly it was hip to have your own email id. And the Internet had arrived to rule.

In 1995, my brother got a job in Australia, after his first 6 months there he came for a holiday to India and got us a computer.
“ Wow, I thought, a computer at home, till today we accessed email only in cyber cafes and in the college computer room. But a computer at home? This is fantastic”.

While we were all squealing in delight while my brother was getting the cables connected, my grandma, finding it hard to resist, asked, “ what has he got from there that you all are so excited about?”

“ A computer grandma, a computer”.

“ Oh a computer? Whats that?

“a computer is a… well computer, a TV like electronic item”, was the closest I could get to explaining it.

“ Ok, is it like a TV? Can we see films and songs in it? ”

In 1998, in India, we weren’t seeing any films on computer, nor listening to music, then a computer was purely for surfing the net, accessing your email id and chatting, typing documents on word, calculating on excel and making presentations on PowerPoint”,

“ No you can’t see films and hear songs but you can use it like a typewriter, and you can see what ever you type on the monitor.”

“ Oh so it’s a typewriter cum TV” she said uninterestedly>

“ Noooo grandma”, how could she dismiss the computer as a typewriter…”its not a typewriter”…

“ Oh ho, then what is it my dear”

By now I was starting to get irritated, my dad intervened, “ mom he said, “ the computer something that has a monitor, which looks like a small TV, has a cassette player kind of box, a typewriter kind of key board, with a remote control called mouse”.

“ So that’s what I said, only this a TV cum Tape recorder cum typewriter with remote control”

My dad guessing that this conversation would go nowhere, decided to leave for some urgent work.

We left the conversation there and continued, around the computer, I checked my emails, got an email id created for myself, and then went to my grandmother and told her,

Do you know grandma, we don’t need the postman now, and I can type letters in the computer and email it to anyone in the world.

“Oh is it? Can we send letters in Tamil? Can we send a letter to Raghu uncle in Madras?”

“ If he has a computer we can, I replied”

“ Why does he need a computer?” she asked angrily, you said we can send him a letter.”

“Yeah I did, but that is through the computer.”

“ What is that for? He simply needs to read the letter only? What will he do with a computer?”

“ Grandma, letter means it will come on his screen, not on paper!”

“ Not on paper? What kind of letter is that? How can the letter you write here on this TV reach his house?”

“ That’s technology grandma?” “ Tech … what?”

“Oh forget it!!” Again I left her to wonder what this computer thing was. As she mumbled… “ Its not a TV but looks like one, its not a typewriter, but you can type with it. It’s not a cassette player, but it looks like one… ohhhh what the hell is this computer? !!!!

The next day we got our Internet connection, and dial up network, we dialed and got through and got my sister in law from Australia to chat with us.

“ We are going to speak to Binita grandma, on chat.”

“ oh ok, tell her I am asking about her? How is she?”

Binita typed back, “ I am fine grandma how are you?”

“ Binita asks how are you grandma?”

“I am fine? Ok,” my grandma screamed, while we all wondered for a second, why she yelled, she told me, “ tell her to speak loudly I cant hear her”


“ Oh grandma, you can’t hear her, she is typing whatever she wants to say and we are reading it here and vice versa”

“ Oh” grandma replied disappointedly, but didn’t you say you were making a phone call?”,

“ Yes but that’s to connect to the Internet, only if we do that we can speak to her”

“ Ah yes yes” , my grandma replied as though she understood, and decided that the computer was a telephone, but instead of hearing each other you can only type and convey messages.

Now the computer was kept on a table just next to my grandma’s bed, and when not in use, we covered it with a big towel, to protect it from the sunlight that came through the window.

One night after dinner, when no one was in the room and were watching TV in the hall, I came to drink some water when I passed my grandmas room, and saw her grouping around the computer. She felt the TV like monitor and mumbled, and this must be the TV, she run her fingers on the keyboard and was frightened that on hearing the sound, we might come there, so she pressed each key slowly and said to herself, “ ahh this is the typewriter”, then as she felt around she caught hold of the mouse, she tried hard to understand what it was from its shape and how it felt in her hand, it definitely didn’t fit her description of a remote, so she left it as it is and went and sat down on her bed again”

She was looking very content on having actually felt and touched this wonder of an electronic item (as she puts it), since its just another item like the fridge, TV, Radio, washing machine etc..
This was something that combined all instruments into one.

The next morning while my brother was checking his mail, she slowly asked him, “does everyone in Australia have a computer at home?”

“ Yes, most of them do, very few don’t”

“ How much did you pay for the computer?”

“ Around 60000 Rs.”

“ 60000 Rupees!!!!!! My god!!” exclaimed my grandmother; the highest and costliest item in our house was probably the washing machine for which we spent 13000/- Rs. She just couldn’t digest it, she got both her daughters married in those days for only 40000/- Rs and that too with lavish spending and this one computer costs so much!

After knowing the price of the computer, my grandma took it as her sole responsibility to safeguard it, if we spent a lot of time on it, she would scold us, if we patted the mouse sometimes in anger and she heard it, she would scream at us wildly, she would ensure that when not in use, it was always covered with the towel, by reaching our from her bed and checking if the towel was in place.

One evening as we all sat for dinner, she told my father, that she finally understood that the computer was a typewriter, which can type letters, put people cannot read it on paper, they need another computer where they can see what you have typed, and that to speak to the person on the other side, you have to first phone the other party, tell them that you are going to talk to them so that what you type here they can see there, but only she didn’t understand how the remote works?

So my dad told her, “ the remote is required to tell the computer what to do, like if I want to type something, I will use the remote, point it at letter and the page will open to type the letter”

Imagining us pointing the mouse on the monitor, just like we did with the TV remote, she nodded her head in agreement.

Many days passed by and the computer fever died down, my brother returned to Australia, and life was as usual when we got the news that my cousin in Madras was to be married. And as per tradition, my dad had to give her the sari that she would wear for the wedding.

Due to office and work, my dad couldn’t go, my grandma’s health was deteriorating and so my mom had to be around to take of her, so both decided that they couldn’t go the wedding. My grandma was frustrated that due to her health my parents were missing the wedding, she kept telling my dad, “no problem, Goma will take of me, you attend the wedding or your sister will be offended”.

But my dad had taken a lot of leave at the behest of grandma’s health and could not get more leave.

So it was finally decided, that my aunt would buy the traditional sari herself and my dad would pay up for it. My grandma was utterly upset at this arrangement. A wedding in which the uncle doesn’t personally present the sari, to the bride is no wedding at all. At least he should buy the sari and send it, not simply ask them to buy it.

But there wasn’t time for that either. Choosing a wedding sari is a time consuming task. Disappointed, but finally grandma gave up.

That night before going to bed, she asked me, cant this computer send a sari to Madras, like it sends letters?