Touch Me Not

The world is divided into two kinds of people - those who love touchscreen phones and those who don't.

Naturally, having been a hopeless technophobe since as long back as I can remember, I belong to the second category. And life is really tough for people like us now, because 'Touch' phones just wont leave us alone...

Well, if you hate Touch phones so, just don't go near one, people would say.  I can only say that that's easier said than done. And I'll tell you why.

About two years ago, Sud gifted me a Micromax touch phone - promising the latest technology at mouth watering prices. Well, I don't know about watering, but I certainly remember foaming at the mouth, trying to use the touchscreen to text or make calls. The experience was a bit like trying to apply mascara with a rolling pin...  

NO more touch screen phones for me, I decided. 

And I switched back to my old phone - a Nokia Expressmusic, which allowed me to do ALL I ever wanted from a phone - to make/receive calls, send text msgs, and listen to music during my travel.  

Cut to the present - about two months ago. The Expressmusic is going to pieces (literally), and it is becoming increasingly difficult to call or sms by pressing the dirty grey exposed bits that I still valiantly keep calling a 'keypad'. I need to buy a new phone. Urgently.

So I go to the store and ask for a simple, regular, non-touch phone. Non-touch, I stress. The shop assistant looks at me with confusion - as if trying to determine whether I am an alien or just stark, raving mad. I'll never know what he decides - because mumbling something incoherent, he just vamooses from the scene. A hunt for him proves futile, and with a resigned air we start looking around on our own at the displayed models of 'Non-touch' phones. Well, when I say 'start looking around' it is a rather ambitious statement, because the search ends almost as soon as it starts. Simple, Non-touch, Un-smart phones have gone out of fashion, and out of the window of all major stores.

I feel utterly devastated... would I have to go for a touch phone after all?  I go back to the store after a week, mentally prepared to say 'yes' to Touch. This time, the shop assistant is more forthcoming. He waxes eloquent about the latest models of 'Smart' touchscreen phones, oblivious to the fact that each new 'App' which he explains only makes me cringe more. At one point of time, I think of asking him sarcastically if there is a phone with an app that would scratch my back when it feels all itchy in the morning... but then think better of it. He doesn't look bright enough to appreciate sarcasm - he would probably trot off to ask his superior if there is any model coming out with that feature...

Anyway, the quality of 'touch' on this one seems better than the Micromax. And the assistant assures me that I'll get used to it in no time. I am still unsure.

But then Sud talks me into it.... just as he always manages to do - starting exactly 24.5 years ago. :-|

And that is how I became the not-really-proud-but-definitely-apprehensive owner of a Touch phone for the second time over. It was a Nokia Lumia 710. It looked good and was not exorbitantly priced. And it had all the net based smart apps. I was starting to think I would enjoy this phone after all.

I was wrong. If a simple 'unsmart' touch phone is a diwali patakha, a 'smart' touch phone is a nuclear bomb - and one that could be detonated with one light, even accidental, 'touch'...

The first problem with the phone is its smart-ass autosuggest mechanism. Initially, you might be rather pleased that the phone is throwing up this long list of suggested alternate words to choose from while you are texting. But, you quickly realize, it is not so much 'smart' as 'too clever by half'. You realize that the phone surreptitiously slips in its own preferred word, even if you have not selected it. I still go red-faced thinking of the many times I have just barely escaped signing off a text as 'Sucks' instead of 'Suchi'!

And it's not just me. Give a thought to the predicament of this young couple we know - they fight, the girl goes off in a huff, and the fight carries on over sms. Some furious texting ensues. The girl is breathing fire when she gets a text calling her a 'libidinous cheap'... but then, when she is called a 'smart potassium', she realizes that it is not her hubby, but his 'smart' touchphone that is doing all the talking! :D

In this particular case the matter ended well, as the girl sees the funny side of it and dissolves into laughter at the inadvertently changed words. But it's not always so...

And oh yes. If smart phones are really so smart, why the hell can't they tell the difference between a person's fingers and ears/cheeks? In the middle of a raging argument with my Mom, or a tete-a-ete with a friend, or a rare call with Sud when he is somewhere down in the boondocks, I press my ear a wee bit to the oh-so-sensitive screen to hear better - and lo! I inadvertently press 'hold'... or 'mute'... or even 'end call'! The last, when it happens, plays absolute havoc with relationships - both sides end up aggrieved, thinking the other hung up in a huff!

It is said that the third world war is going to be over water. I disagree - I am absolutely certain it is going to be caused by touch phones.. Just imagine, some small but powerful developing nation announces its plans to build up a nuclear arsenal. The US Prez hears this, and texts the Secretary of State, "Call them NOW! Talk them out...!" And what might happen if he uses his 'smart' touchscreen phone to send the text? The Secretary of State gets this message, "Bomb them NOW! Take them out...!"

But there is good news too. My son, who has made losing and destroying phones into a fine art, has had to choose a new phone twice in the last 2 months. No no, that by itself is not the good news... the good news is that both times, he has decided on a simple, regular, non-touch phone. Which proves, without any doubt, that touch-o-phobia is not an age related disorder. So, touche, ye unkind folk, who maketh unkind remarks to me, like, "You are just too old for smartphones and touchscreen, dear!"

It's time, my fellow touch-o-phobes! To make ourselves heard and prove that we are human beings and not lemmings. Let those who want Touch have it, but let us at least have the option of passing up Touch for a Non-touch alternative which is not archaic in all other ways!

Are you listening... Nokia, Samsung, Sony et al...... ?

Grumbling. Ranting. Railing.

After that shamelessly soppy farewell to my laptop, here I am- writing the first post from a ‘new’ machine - ye olde desktop… my Common or Garden variety home PC.

And let me admit, when my laptop was taken away from me (rather forcibly, because in a last ditch effort I did pull out all stops to retain it - but to no avail), I did not foresee the ‘situation’ that was developing.

Let me begin my lamentations by describing my desktop first. It has an outsized monitor. I never thought adjusting to a monitor would take so much doing! Have you ever been stuck with front row seats at a cinema? Recall the experience. The disconcerting effect that the too-near and too-large screen has on you – you watch the film resignedly, but you just can’t shake off the feeling that the world is somehow totally out of proportion. That is exactly the effect that this monitor has on me.

Now imagine trying to adjust to this giant after years of gazing into the petite 12 inch screen of my old laptop.

Juxtapose this with an undersized keyboard. It is about 10 inches across, and feels more like a toy than the real thing. The feeling I get when I am trying to type anything meaningful on it is somewhat like trying to play raga bhairavi on a one-octave casio keyboard. L

And then there is the mouse – a supremely eccentric being, which rests more often than it works. Like a worker holding a grudge against the management, it just stops working, all of a sudden, right in the middle of a busy day. And when this happens, I have no alternative but to go out and beg, borrow or steal a mouse from somewhere before shutting all operations.

Want to hear more? The machine’s sound card does not work… so no music! And that for me, is a fatal blow.

Beginning to get an idea now? Anyway, this is not where my bemoanings end.

I obviously need a new laptop since I intend traveling a great deal in times to come. And it has to be a tablet because I want to keep up my attempts at sketching and cartooning. And what do I find? That tablet PCs have vanished from the Indian market. You either have to choose ipad type devices, or regular laptops – the beautiful thing that was a marriage between the two - my old machine, a lightweight tablet PC, seems to exist only in foreign shores and my daydreams right now.

So, you see, at the present moment, finding a laptop of my choice seems an even more unlikely event than my going and dancing at Ramdev’s dharna.

So, mera toh chakka jam - pahiya poori tarah se keechad mein phans gaya … ideas, suggestions and even bhashans welcome on how to pull the wheel out of the mud and get going again…

Much Mushiness about a Machine

Have you noticed, how we are increasingly ascribing human qualities to technological devices, and are starting to interact with them as if they were human?

We ‘are in love with’ a new camera, or ‘totally detest’ a new phone – strong emotions, normally reserved for other humans.

We even experience ups and downs in the relationship with a gadget, There are infatuations, when we love a gadget at first sight – the sleek finish, the vibrant colour of a new MP3 player. You buy it on an impulse... and then come the hate pangs, when you realise the gadget is more style than substance, and have to take it back for servicing repeatedly. At other times, the opposite happens too – when some gadget that looks rather staid and uninteresting in the beginning endears itself to us through its steady and loyal performance.

I have definitely experienced this. And for that reason this post is special. You see, it is the last one I will be writing on my beloved HP tablet, with whom I have shared a long and close relationship.

The tablet was not my first laptop, and my old laptop was much more user friendly and a high performer to boot. But this machine was more special for many many reasons.

Three years ago, when tablets were rare in the Indian market, I saw this model at a Geonet outlet and fell for it hook, line and sinker. It looked petite yet classy, and I had never used touchscreen before. I just could not rest till one of these machines was in my possession.

Well, that was then. Since then we have been through a great deal together. It has travelled high and low with me – from Bhanpura to Pittsburg. It has been with me through good times - helped me make numerous successful presentations for workshops, seminars and internal meetings, and helped me build and launch my company’s most ambitious product – an intelligent math-learning programme. It has helped me rediscover what is really valuable in life - it has helped me reconnect with long-lost friends through FB, helped me reconnect with the nostalgia of times gone by. I have watched Jaane bhi do yaron, Ek ruka hua faisla and other such cult films on it, and I have collected a treasure chest of haunting music from the past - Joan Baez , the Ventures, Mary Hopkins etc etc - on it.

It has even helped me whip up a pretty nice ‘aloo posto’ when my kids demanded it rather suddenly :)

And it has been with me through bad times. When so-called friends left me out in the cold, it helped me rekindle childhood friendships, and keep in touch with a few good friends. And recently, when I went through a rough patch in life – with ill health and an overall crisis of confidence, it stood by me like a rock – along with my immediate family and a handful of close friends.

This is the machine on which I started blogging, with more than a little push from the above mentioned people, of course. And it was because I had the touchscreen function on this machine that the amateur cartoonist in me could ‘come out’, so to speak.

Aur haan yaar, it has not been as one-sided as it sounds. I have been by its side through thick and thin too, haan! Kya kya nahi karwaya iss ne mujh se – it has been repaired, re-repaired, and re-re-repaired. Parts have been replaced. Its mother board has conked off twice - once right in the middle of an important official meeting. It lets out a shrill eerie sound if the top is not held at an angle of its liking.

It has in turns behaved like a nut, a bully, and a tantrum-throwing brat. But as I now realise, NEVER has it misbehaved at times of real crises.

It was only when the company I used to work for asked me to return it, at rather short notice, that I realised that my machine was ‘technically’ not mine. For some time I felt like screeching like those melodramatic adoptive mothers from Hindi films – ‘Nahi, issey maine paal pos ke bada kiya hai...main issey nahi le jaane doongi... nahi, nahiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiieeee...............!!!!'

But what has to be done has to be done.

Sure, it has been a tumultuous relationship. But we had accepted each other with all our quirks and imperfections, and grown to love each other (Do I see some raised eyebrows here? Be banished, thee non-believers - as I explained earlier, I fully believe it understands me much better than most humans do). And I can’t help but feel emotional in parting with it.

But goodbye it is. It is with this, that I feel a true sense of closure with the phase of life that just passed. So here’s to a new journey – hopefully one that would be even more challenging and fulfilling than the last... and hope my next laptop is as good a friend to me as this one has been....

The Mother of all Technologies

A revolution (to be henceforth known as the February Revolution) took place in our home this month. My mother-in-law discovered Short Messaging Service.

All of us blessed with parents, parents-in-law, and sundry aunts, uncles and neighbours of over 50 years of age must have gone through the ordeal of familiarising them with ‘gadgets’ and technology. I remember trying to teach my Mom the (what I thought) simple exercise of clearing up old messages from her cell phone. What ensued was an hour of struggle, during which I pulled out clumps of hair and gnashed my teeth almost continually. Finally, I gave up. And cleared all the messages myself – all 653 of them, over the next 3 hours.

At that moment I was even weak enough to excuse my teenage son for the ‘nostrils-flare fiery-glare rude-words-fare’ he treats me to when I ask him simple questions like ‘How do I copy songs from my laptop into my cell phone?’

It really is a mental block. The ‘Technology Block Syndrome’, which seems to develop once you cross a certain age, though the exact age at which it develops is a much debated issue. I think the onset age for TBS is 55 onwards. My son seems to disagree – he believes the age is closer to 35.

Anyway, empirical evidence shows TBS afflicts about 90% of people above 55. So, it really was a pleasant surprise when my mother-in-law first caught hold of my 10-year old daughter, Ananya to teach her to send text messages, and subsequently took to ‘sms-ing’ like fish to water.

There was much excitement – and commotion in the initial days. A few bewildered men and women got hit by stray bullets - Amma was unwittingly sending messages to wrong numbers! They got badgered with message after message from her. Sample this:

6 am. Amma to Mr. X: ‘Going for a walk’
6.30 am. Amma to Mr. X: ‘Who am I talking to’ 
6.45 am. Amma to Mr. X: ‘I am Amma.’

Poor hapless souls, who had no clue who Amma, aka Vijaya Srinivas was! Some of them, like Mr. X, actually called back, fascinated by the mysterious Amma - probably wondering if these were some kind of coded messages...

More mirth was to follow – what with the fervent texting spree to friends and family. It gave a whole new meaning to ‘hypertext’... ;)

At about this time, she embarked on a trip to Dindigul, on her own. And thus started a persistent stream of messages! She even started using sms lingo like a pro. ‘R u in for lunch?’ and ‘Call before kma goes to school’... kma here being Kannamma, the pet name by which she calls Ananya.

Here is a string of texts that started with the train journey:

12.05 pm. Amma to Sudarshan: 'Train moving'
12.06 pm. Amma to Madhusudan: 'Train moving'
12.30 pm. Amma to Sudarshan: 'So far so good'
12.37 pm. Amma to Madhusudan: 'Had soup good company'
1.00 pm. Amma to Madhusudan: 'Had lunch'
1.01 pm. Amma to Sudarshan: 'Had lunch'
1.02 pm. Amma to Suchi: 'Had lunch'
4 pm. Amma to Madhusudan: 'In Pune'
5.30 pm. Amma to Sudarshan: 'In Daund' 

and so on, till the next day, when she reached her destination.

Well, I must say – at least one need not worry about the well being of one’s dear ones with this kind of minute-by-minute status updates.... I have to say, most people today (including me) need to learn from this – they just seem to vanish into thin air when on an out-of-town trip!

She even made an attempt to strike a conversation with Amartya... 

4 pm. Amma to Amartya: 'whatsup? answer by sms'
4.15 pm. Amma to Amartya: 'Did you get the sms'
5 pm. Amma to Amartya: 'ANSWER'

As you can see, it started off rather amicably, and ended ... well...! Amartya, of course, is quite immune to all attempts from immediate family to make conversation. You could even say he was the only one who dared violate the hypertext transfer protocol... :)

Initially, the inadvertent typos that crept in while she was struggling to master the keyboard made the messages all the more fun to read – ‘Did kma go to pchool today?’... But now she is pretty adept at it, and has serious conversations with friends and relatives of all shapes, sizes and ages. Yesterday, a reverent ex-student smsed her, ‘Who do you think will win today’s match?’

We were quite surprised. And impressed!

Well, maybe, in telling this story I have taken a few artistic liberties, gone a wee bit beyond the truth – but by and large I have NOT deviated much. So, you see, it really is nothing less than a revolution. And now I have a technologically empowered ma-in-law!

Truly, hats off, Amma!

Here’s looking forward to many more February Revolutions... in every household...