Words by Alexi Barnstone

At 94 years old my grandma (we call her the greek word Yiayia) visited Australia for the first time. Flying economy class from Missouri she arrived keen to see all this country had to offer. She visited the Opera house, drank wine in the Southern Highlands, made deep eye contact with an emu in Taronga Zoo, bathed in the sun at Coogee beach, and saw her first kangaroo.

Yiayia sporting the best sun glasses to ever exist on this earth

She indulged herself in Australia’s brilliant array of Asian food. Most notably she had dumplings for the first time in 22 years. Prawn and Chive. She was not interested in eating any other type. When I suggested that she might not know what was best since she hasn’t had them in my lifetime she laughed. “I remember what they taste like! I never forget a dumpling.”

Over the past two weeks we have spent many hours talking about the family, her life and her plans in the next couple years – of which she has many.

In Missouri she has an 89-year-old doctor who is interested in her. She says that the doctor was smitten because of her fashion sense. Her last relationship ended 12 years ago. Her boyfriend, a Spanish professor of comparative literature from Salamanca, was taken by Alzheimer’s.

Yiayia is sharp as a tack. She can speak Greek, Spanish, English and French. She can read Latin and ancient Greek. She manages property and the entire extended family. The queen never rests.

She saw me writing this article and demanded that I explain why she is so healthy. In her youth she was a runner in her school. She never drank much and always ate healthily. Greek olive oil (on everything) is key according to her. Most importantly she was a dancer. “We always danced, whenever we could. I would always meet up with friends and dance. I danced my whole life and now I am healthy.”

Truth be told she still hasn’t stopped dancing. Here she is in Greece last summer at 4 AM in a night club…….

And yet, as sharp as she is, sometimes her age seems so apparent. Elder people are often subject to criticism from younger generations while they fumble around with a smartphone or asking seemingly redundant questions. But the more time I spent with Yiayia the more I realised that it isn’t a product of some kind of depressing decay. It was a function of how drastically different the modern world is compared to what it was in their hay day.

My grandmother was born in Constantinople and forced to leave it when it was retaken by the Turkish after World War I. She lived through World War II and the Nazi occupation of Greece, moved to America and experienced the murder of JFK, Martin Luther King, and John Lennon. She watched the moon landing, the collapse of the Berlin wall, and Watergate unfold all from the comfort of her couch. She visited Franco’s Spain in 1951 and thought about buying a Picasso for roughly $100. She decided not to. She thought it was overpriced.

The contemporary world bears little resemblance to the near past. Technology and progress has shaped society, sometimes leaving people a little perplexed. So…… I thought I would ask her, what are the 5 things that confuse you the most about the modern world?

Here is a list of her 5 answers.

Smartphones

The first thing Yiayia did when I asked her was hold up the Iphone in her left hand. Bamboozled by the device she often asks for help sending a text or finding a contact. When she was in her 20’s most people couldn’t afford a car. Telephones were rare and she wrote letters to distant relatives. The device will most likely never ever make sense to her. “I don’t understand how to move one piece of information into another part of the phone.” At least she won’t be an instagram influencer anytime soon.

Computers

On a similar strain Yiayia experiences her fair share of difficulties with the computer. Luckily she has mastered skype and can contact us no matter where she is on the globe. When I asked her what confused her about it she simply said; “how do they fit so much into so little? It does too many things.”

How kids have fun these days

“I don’t get it, how do you have fun these days?” Yiayia expressed an significant degree of confusion about this. “you all seem to use your devices. But no one dances like they used to. We used to dance all the time, whenever we could, and now I don’t think people dance as much. Throughout my entire life I have thrown parties. We would cook wonderful meals and invite people over to dance all night. If you don’t do this how do you have fun?”

How Timtams are so damn good

In fairness. This may have been a product of the day that I asked her about what confused her because we had just given Yiayia her first Tim Tam. She was in heaven. It was staple to the Australian experience and she could not get enough. Praise the Timtams. “how do they make these?” she inquired. A just question I had no answer to.

The rise of right-wing populism

What did my Yiayia say the final thing was that confused her? The rise of right-wing populism. Not exactly what I had thought she was say, but more than relevant. Having lived through World War II in Europe, she couldn’t understand how it was possible. How could democracies allow demagogues to rise to power? “Haven’t we learned our lesson?” she asked. “We are too quick to forget history.”

Stay woke Yiayia.

5 Things That Confuse My Grandma About The Modern World