AFVOA Newletters of Year 2006

Page 22 of 77 14. If one pursues interesting hobbies like philately or numismatics, the search engines give a plethora of information on the nuances of a particular query from the knowledge data base that is available. For example, in philately, most of us know that the penny black of UK was the first adhesive stamp used in regular postal service from 1840. However many of us do not know that it was used for just 2 years and that 68 million stamps were printed! If one does come across this seemingly rare stamp, one could get to know the date, the sheet roll it was printed from, the watermark, the colour tint, any errors in that particular series and finally the estimated value—all from research done on the net. If one finds that a particular penny black which one had found in an old family trunk could be bought on E-bay or through Stanley Gibbons for just a few pounds, it may of course result in a deflated ego!! 15. If one is into doll making, there are many doll-making groups having hundreds of members exchanging notes, lessons, conducting competitions across the globe. Similarly there is online gaming for bridge, Scrabble, in addition to on-line gambling. For the music- lovers the sky is the limit as one can get the golden oldies as well as the latest songs of the different styles of music. The point I am making is that there is so much of information that is in the world-wide-web that one can keep one’s mind occupied and active so that dementia does not set in. For many of our fellow veteran members who must have their daily quota of jokes, there are enough types from the philosophical to the evangelical to the “non-vegetarian” ones that one can savour! 16. Even if one does not use an internet connection , the computer can be used to write one’s auto- biography. All of us have so many pleasant(and unpleasant!) memories of our past from our childhood to the present day, that just typing them into the computer memory, and then editing them, is by itself an enduring pastime, which will keep one’s grey cells in motion for a long time. For your immediate next generation, your writing may not hold much interest, but it does appeal to the second generation grand-children who are far removed from the places and times of one’s experience, particularly if it is interspersed with scanned photographs of the past. As an example, my mother started her auto-biography at the age of eighty on a computer and she has completed about 228 foolscap (occupying about 800 Kb of memory) pages so far, covering 83 years of her life and times. It makes for interesting reading to the grand children who induced her to write. The events of the early days of Simla, Delhi and Burma in the twenties and thirties of the last century, the mores and travails of the South Indian families moving away for their vocations elsewhere, with graphic descriptions of incidents concerning relatives, friends and associates long since departed, are strange happenings of a by-gone era, to the young generation, living in a totally different environment today. 17. Another interesting pastime is the research for establishing the family tree and tracing one’s family’s genealogical lineage. In western countries this is comparatively easy as church and parish records have details of births, baptisms, marriages and deaths. For us here, information can be only gleaned through word of mouth or through old correspondence and documents as well as photographs. The juicy tit-bits about prodigal gents and wayward ladies can only be gathered in gossip sessions with grand aunts and grand uncles. Invariably only the pet names will be remembered by the nonagenarians and we have to fill in the blanks after confirmation from other long lost relatives who we invariably come across at some wedding or other family function. Some of the genealogy software available now allows for a biographical sketch of each of one’s illustrious as well as not so illustrious ancestors! 18. I would, therefore, fervently recommend for those of us who are not otherwise fully occupied to take up hobbies that keep our minds and bodies ticking instead of being slaves to the idiot box. We should also fully exploit the PC for our mental well being.