To: Times before Internet

I was just wondering about the times when there were no smartphones and limited hi-tech devices, which are readily accessible in today's time.

Just imagine if I am pondering over those times, even though I've been through them, I've grown up in them, what would happen to the next generations. How would they perceive the era gone-by?

Sometimes, I think it is a whole circle. After the world reaches the peak of technological advancements, it starts to urge for a little peace in life, a small pause to the fastmoving world. I remember we had to introduce 'No phone hour' at our home during the lockdown as everyone in our house was playing some media content at a time. If one person was taking a break from phone, then it was someone else's turn to catch onto the updates that there hardly was any hour of silence. Hence, the idea of No Phone Hour, at the end of which everyone ran to their devices.

I can say for sure that back in those times people had a hard time acquiring any information that was not available on the platter. Remember turning the pages of a dictionary and recounting in your mind the sequence of alphabet a-z to locate the word.

Courtesy internet, all the mouth-watering pictures of the delicious homemade foods that are frequently uploaded on social media handles. Availability of abundant videos of accomplished chefs serving you out first-hand knowledge of how to make so-and-so food that we can boast of our culinary skills.

I remember a decade back, video content wasn't this common, only food manuals were available in the market through which one could learn to make a dish (or by joining a cooking class). We had tried a lot to make a cake in the newly bought microwave, but all we could serve was hard crispy biscuits or squishy wheat flour.

Now years after, my sibling sent us over a bowl of it in her first attempt. We were surprised and doubted if she made it by using ready-to-cook MTR powder or so. 

She called me over to her house and asked me to make it on my own, by giving me directions: put this much of this (playing the video tutorial simultaneously) and I too succeded.

In the initial years of the internet sensation, my sibling used to tell us about a website called Youtube on which you could access any video, song, movie, show etc that you wanted. I found that idea very exciting. "You mean we can play any song that we want whenever we want?" 

Those were the times when broadcasters on radios and TVs used to play requests for the songs from listeners and viewers.

I remember in early days of 2G internet access, I used to analyse the name of the song and seeing the name of my favourite singers, I used to download only a few songs and play them if they were good enough to be retained in the phone memory.

Nowadays, we hardly download any of them. We stream all our content online, sometimes taking the music played for granted by not even listening to it properly as we are so busy in multitasking.

Back then, everyone used to wind up all their tasks in advance so that they are free in the time when their favourite show is broadcasted on TV. If by any chance, you missed watching it, one would check the newspaper for its repeat timing. Now, even if all of us are watching the same content but we are all watching it on our own devices at the times best suited to each one of us. 

No doubt, technology has negatively affected us and it does become an obstruction in our peace but this post is dedicated to the positive impact that it had which we may tend to take for granted in future times.