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My first experience with telepresence.
Apr. 19th, 2011 12:49 amOriginally, Lis and I had been planning on going down to Florida, to her parents' place for Pesach. My parents hadn't been planning on having a seder. But then things happened -- my parents' plans for the first seder fell through, my foster-sister mentioned that my niece and nephew would have a day off of school, and my mother's brothers mentioned that they really wouldn't mind spending the time with family. With my grandfather's death, my mother and her siblings have really needed each other recently. So Lis and I changed our plans, and stayed up here for the first seder.
Of course, my sister wouldn't be able to be there, right? While my foster sister and her family live in New England, only a few hours away from my parents, my birth sister lives in Florida, which is a bit more of a challenge. But Leila WANTED to be there, and my niece and nephew wanted to see her.
Skype provided the solution. We put Mom's laptop at a place at the end of the table, and Leila set her laptop up in her house, and she got her own food and seder stuff, and we did the seder together.
After the seder part of the seder, we carried the laptop downstairs, and my niece and nephew and sister and I all played Apples to Apples together. We had to hold her cards up to the laptop camera so she could know what she had -- and to not look at the little image at the bottom which shows what the camera is pointing at -- and she'd tell us which card to play by saying a number from one to five -- and it worked.
I got to play a card game with my niece and nephew who were next to me, and my sister, who is more than a thousand miles away.
Letters are great. Telephones are great. Email, texting/IM/GTalk, wonderful. But this? Amazing.
Nowhere NEAR as good as actually being together, but so much better than not. Emotionally, it really means something.
Of course, my sister wouldn't be able to be there, right? While my foster sister and her family live in New England, only a few hours away from my parents, my birth sister lives in Florida, which is a bit more of a challenge. But Leila WANTED to be there, and my niece and nephew wanted to see her.
Skype provided the solution. We put Mom's laptop at a place at the end of the table, and Leila set her laptop up in her house, and she got her own food and seder stuff, and we did the seder together.
After the seder part of the seder, we carried the laptop downstairs, and my niece and nephew and sister and I all played Apples to Apples together. We had to hold her cards up to the laptop camera so she could know what she had -- and to not look at the little image at the bottom which shows what the camera is pointing at -- and she'd tell us which card to play by saying a number from one to five -- and it worked.
I got to play a card game with my niece and nephew who were next to me, and my sister, who is more than a thousand miles away.
Letters are great. Telephones are great. Email, texting/IM/GTalk, wonderful. But this? Amazing.
Nowhere NEAR as good as actually being together, but so much better than not. Emotionally, it really means something.