Sans technology

In corporate lingo I am supposed to be a 'techie' - sounds good eh? Here am I am writing about my life without technology - irony, yep hands down!

A week after I landed here, we were bereft of the internet. K was in a shared accomodation and the person who moved out had the internet connection in his name. So when he moved, out went the internet with him. I somehow managed by checking emails at some of his colleagues' homes. Then I discovered the library and the free internet facility there. I could book computers for 2 hours everyday and browse(This explains my long irregularity in the blog world, both reading and writing. Not that it matters a lot to a lot of people :D. 2 hours were way too less but then atleast I had a continued access. )

We had somehow gotten used to the routine of having no internet.  We had South Park, Everybody loves Raymond and Scrubs for entertainment at home. During dinner, we used to sit with a sitcom for while, after which I would retire with a book while K would indulge in a game or a movie of his choice. Slowly as I got attuned to visiting the library and spending more time there, somehow my need for the laptop waned and I drifted towards books and developing an eclectic taste in them. But K's hold over the laptop was not to continue for too long. Suddenly the laptop charger went kaput! Ahem, now imagine. No tv, no internet, no laptop, the cell phones which ring only when K or I call eachother ( Sometimes K's colleagues call him, but apart from that, we make the customary calls home and thats more like it ). I read Abhishek's post some days back about technology having nearly ransacked every part and parcel of our lives, and here I was, in an ahem developed *rolls eyes* country sans technology.

I adjusted fine to the demise of the laptop charger. Slowly K had to drift away from technology to keep himself busy. So there he was forced to read - comics and conspiracy theory stories were his liking. But none the less, thanks to the lack of any gadgets, the house was full of books and the most companionable silence possible. It had both of us resting on the sofa and reading our time off. There was no hurry, no noise,  no disturbance - just the sound of pages flipping, giggles coming when we read something funny, each telling the other if we found something interesting and then getting on a track to discuss stuff. It was just us, our thoughts and the thoughts of the writers - a warm cosy cocoon. Its gone to such an extent that now the 20 books I am authorized to take at a time are getting exhausted in no time and K too has applied for his library membership! People who know him will vouch that K and libraries dont go together, but now we are experiencing a brand new love affair!

I am really satisfied that we got to try this - we got to keep away the ipods, the phones, the laptops, the television sets and enjoy something as simple but enchanting as a book. There is no experience which is more enriching.