When we carelessly use the term, ‘The greatest thing since sliced bread’, our kids probably think, “So what’s so great about sliced bread?” but some of us have lived in places and in a time when there was none.

As a child, I recall going down the road to the bakery and buying a loaf of bread still warm from the oven (is there anything more tempting that that?) and going home to attack it straight away. An essential item in kitchens in those days was a bread knife and board and we had one standing on the platform, always ready for use. Wielding that knife on an extra soft loaf was not easy and finally I would give in to impatience and break off a piece of crust and start munching. The rest would also cut the loaf to suit the level of their hunger in a variation of the old idiom: cutting one’s coat according to the cloth. So some would hack off a quarter, others a tiny wedge, and all of us would have our fill.

Sometime later, when a slicing machine arrived at the bakery, we would watch in fascination as the loaf was guided along and evenly thin slices fell into a waiting bin. There were times, however, when we skipped that ritual – preferring old-fashioned ‘breaking of bread’ and the freedom to choose widths and lengths for ourselves in our food-centric home.

There are other everyday items that also bring back memories of a time when they were not seen in our milieu. Handbags, pencil containers, clothes...everything you look at today that requires fastening has a zip attached to it and in one whirr it opens or closes. But I remember when bags had clasps, trousers had buttons, and our dresses had rows of hook and eyes that our mother, who was a seamstress in addition to many other things, painstakingly sewed on. When someone came from abroad and tossed her a packet of zips, she treated them like a consignment of gold biscuits, storing them carefully in a hidden compartment in her sewing box, and using them only when absolutely necessary – and we felt like stars on the red carpet when she deemed them ‘necessary’ for our first ‘grown-up’ dresses!

In time, we took zips for granted but Mother could never get over her high regard for them. Even when they were easily available, she could not discard a dress or skirt or a pair of trousers which had a working zip. No, she had to snip off the zip neatly and keep it in that cache to be re-used later.

What about walking shoes? We cannot imagine our morning constitutional or any form of exercise, even trudging around on sightseeing trips, without branded cushioned soles for our tender feet; but when we were young, it was the ubiquitous ‘Kolhapuri chappal’ (slippers) that took us everywhere. Their tough leather had to be ‘broken in’ and they became truly comfortable a couple of blisters later – yet, we walked our feet off in them.

And, would you believe it? We also didn’t have jeans! My first pair was bought second hand from a seedy store – much to my parents’ horror – and soaked in antiseptic and detergent and whatever prehistoric stuff we had at our disposal, before it was used...and used...and lived in...and finally fell off me in shreds. (Perhaps if I had known shreds would be a fashion statement someday, I’d have hung on to them!)

So now, when someone talks of the greatest thing since ... whatever ... I listen. Who knows what new worlds they have to open to us?

Cheryl Rao is a journalist based in India.