"What is that?" Screamed my elder son, Arunabh, all excited. He had a seen a 'new' gadget (boys will be boys). We were watching the India-West Indies ODI Cricket (Shouldn't this now be called F-50?). A man was holding this 'thing' near his ears.
I looked surprised at my son. "That thing is a transistor radio," I said.
"A what?"
"You know, a transistor radio. You can listen to radio on the move ...." I ended lamely.
Then it hit me between my eyes. I belong to the last generation. I am the buggy-whip manufacturer in the age of automobile. Felt like Rip Van Winkle.
Let's see what else has changed since my childhood (I am talking of those things that have disappeared; not those that did not even exist, like, Internet, Mobiles, etc).
Radio with diode tubes
Telephones with circular dialer (you needed to insert your finger at the appropriate numbered hole and turn the dialer clockwise to the end)
Steam engine
Black & White Television
Cyclostyle copiers
To the older(age-wise) readers:
Do you no longer see things that defined your generation?
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4 comments:
...a mechanical typewriter
Oh yes, how can I forget that? Thanks Deepa.
In fact, shortly before computers took over offices in India, I also saw something called an Electronic Typewriter. It was a keyboard, printer and a one line display rolled into one.
Cassette Players...though a few still hold onto their own ones these players have become extinct the disc'men' and then later the 'pods' from the planet 'apple' made the cassette players and thus cassettes redundant(forgive me, but I sometimes cannot control myself from stating the obvious facts).
Not really ARJuna, my car has a cassette player and one can still but music cassettes. But you are right. Cassettes may soon become history.
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