It was 2005. Today I remembered the first time I made a blog. It wasn’t even a big thing, but back then it felt huge. My cousin had this computer in his room. I used to stand behind him, watching him click things like he was some kind of magician.

One day, he let me use it.

I held the mouse like it was something rare. I remember the mouse pad — blue, cheap, but at that time it felt like technology itself. I went on Blogger and made my first blog. I had nothing to write, but seeing that page with my name on it felt like opening a small window into the world. Later, after two years (around ’07/’08), I posted my first writing ever — a poem (I will someday translate it).

Screenshot of my blog 2005

My brother and I mostly played Minesweeper. Those little bombs used to scare me, even though they only made a tiny sound. That small white (not pure white) square — I still feel nostalgic about it. Sometimes I even try to find that game, but everything has changed since then. If you still want to play, see the notes section at the end. Funny thing — I don’t think I ever enjoyed any game more than that.

I also remembered 2003 — the cyber café days, before my cousin had a computer, and even after that (there were some restrictions). I used to visit cyber cafés to check my email or, well, other things. I created my first Yahoo email while sitting on a plastic chair that kept shaking. The room was full of clicking noises and people typing fast, like they had somewhere important to go. Most of them, I guess, were just chatting (after all, we are humans — gossipers). Even Noah wrote in his book that our civilization flourished under a gossiping culture.

But, for sure, I didn’t get any emails.
Well, except Hi5’s. I made a Hi5 account because I thought maybe someone would message me there. I didn’t even know what it was, but the cyber café guy told me he had one.

Notes, November 16, 2006 (from my blog)

That year, everyone was joining new things online.
I was excited at first. I made some friends too — random faces from random places. But soon I got bored. The layouts, the backgrounds, the same flashing texts… I don’t know. I always get bored fast. Maybe too fast. I got bored with Hi5 already.

I still remember making two trips to the cyber café just to check Yahoo Mail. Twice in a month felt like a lot back then. Forty rupees (0.91 AUD at the time, I can guess because my cousin went to Australia a few years later, so I know the math) per hour wasn’t cheap. And having no emails after waiting so many days… yeah, it sucked. Felt like I was waiting for something that never came.

But then one day, in my Yahoo inbox, I saw a mail.

Not a spam. Not a system message.
A real message from a real person.

It had a poem in it. Or something like a poem. Free lines, not too long, but enough to make me sit straight and read it twice. I got nervous, minimized Yahoo, and tried finding her on Hi5.

No luck.

So I mailed her back.

Notes, May 16, 2007 (from my blog)

Back then, emailing felt like… I don’t know, something cool. Like sharing a secret.
You write something and wait for days, maybe weeks, hoping someone replies.
I used to go to the cyber café every month with whatever money I could save. Forty rupees for one hour of hope.

It wasn’t much, but it felt like a big thing — sitting there, checking if someone somewhere in the world had sent a few words meant for me.

And honestly, sometimes just thinking about the email was the best part.

Notes, December 3, 2005

Today I went to the cyber café again. It’s funny — the computers make the same humming sound every day, but somehow it feels different depending on my mood. The uncle at the counter didn’t even look at me; he just said, “Forty rupees. One hour.” Like always.

I sat on the third computer (I always had a spot — still do, in my usual restaurant, library, sofas, dining table… imagine everywhere) from the window — the one with the keyboard where the “A” key is almost fading. Someone must have typed a lot of love letters on that key.

First thing I did: checked Yahoo.
No mail.

I tried refreshing three times even though I knew it wouldn’t change anything. Then I checked the folder, deeply hidden, in a folder inside a folder, like 50 folders (believe me, in partition C: — normally no one would suspect, but there used to be one folder called ‘fell-n-fall’; I still have that folder name in Yahoo, though now it contains important emails. The C: partition that held that folder also contained… well, other things). I watched it for three seconds.

Then I checked Hi5. Still nothing. I think my profile picture looks weird; I had to use an old scanned photo. It looks like I’m staring at someone who owes me money.

After that, I opened Google and searched random things — lyrics of songs I didn’t know, pictures of places I would never go, blogs of people who wrote like they knew life better than me. (I never googled for books those days, I wonder.)

Sometimes I wonder how these strangers write so openly. I can barely tell my feelings to myself.

But still, I wrote a small line in my blog in April 2006:

“Some days the internet feels like a huge world. Some days it feels like a locked room with only my echo inside.”

I don’t know why I wrote that.
Maybe it’s true.

Notes, January 10, 2009 — SMS Days

My phone vibrated today — one SMS.
Just one, and my heart jumped like it was a love letter.
But it was my telecom service telling me I had 0.50 rupees left.

Still, that vibration felt good. Phones were shy back then — they didn’t ring a hundred times a day.

I remember when sending an SMS cost one rupee. I used to type everything in short codes:

“k xa?” — 'How are you?'
“tmro exam kti baje?” — 'When is your exam?'
“nt cming tmrw.”

I don’t even know why we thought saving characters mattered so much.

There was this one girl in Bachelor (after high school) who used to send me long messages with proper punctuation (she was rich). It made her look older, smarter, and — more importantly — richer.
She stopped messaging after final year of undergrad. Sad.
I still remember the sound of that Nokia button — center button, down, down, open message.

Sometimes I scroll through my inbox even now. I have had this same Yahoo email since… well, forever. It feels like opening a time capsule filled with small, shaky hopes… so many secrets… it’s my trove now.

Screenshot 2005

Notes, February 28, 2010 — School and Friends

I met my school friends today. Funny how we used to spend years together and now meet twice a year like strangers pretending to remember everything (one joined the army after high school).

We talked about nothing but acted like it was important — football, teachers, that one guy who failed twice and still looks happier than any of us, the joints we smoked, porn we watched together, that CD we burned (“Lucky” by Britney Spears). The first time one of our friends told us he downloaded ringtones from websites, I didn’t even know phones could do that. It was too funny to chat about.

Notes, March 13, 2007 — Music & Nights

Last night, I listened to Nabin K. Bhattarai on a cheap music player (Chinese, deep pink speaker ring). One side works, the other doesn’t, but it still felt good. Music sounded like it was coming from somewhere deep inside my shirt.

I also discovered mp3skull.com today — it looked illegal even to my 19-year-old eyes. Still, I downloaded one song: “Remember Me.”
It took 18 minutes. This song, I mostly send to my friends when we start chatting these days. It has been my favorite since then.

Screenshot 2005

But those 18 minutes felt like waiting for something precious. Now everything downloads in seconds, and nothing feels special.

I fell asleep thinking maybe life was simpler because everything took time — and we had no choice but to wait. I slept well the next two nights too because I discovered something rare.

footer of my blog 2005