Nascom Mum bought Bijjy a Nascom computer kit in 1977 at a computer exhibition for his 16th Birthday. The Nascom 1 was a single-board computer based on the Zilog Z80 and included a Keyboard and Video interface, as well as a Serial port that could be used for storing data on a tape cassette. The Nascom was a state of the art computer kit and could do pretty much whatever the much pricier Apple 1 was capable. At the time we were really unsure of our future and needless to say our budget was very tight. Mum was a computer programmer and earned less than £6500 and dad was in India working with Air India. We did not own a car or a video cassette recorder (the most coveted gadget of the time). Bijjy was with mum at the exhibition and they bought the Nascom for over £200.00. Bijjy was thrilled and was well aware of the magnitude of the purchase. The two of them took the tube home from Earls Court and walked home with the Nascom computer in a large plastic shopping bag. Over the next couple of weeks Bijjy put the Nascom Kit together. He learned to read circuit design and solder. This was the seventies and polyester was big both in clothing and carpeting. To prevent static electricity from the carpeting and clothing shorting any of the circuits or blowing out the very expensive chips, Bijjy would stand on sheets of aluminum foil wearing minimum clothing while working on the Nascom. We all took it very serious them but looking back it was a really funny sight. When time came to connect the power supply and fire up the Nascom we were all terrified of being electrocuted. After weeks of hard work the computer refused to work and he decided to take it to the Nascom help center after school. He was gone for hours and hours and when he didn't get back by 9p.m. Mum and I were really worried. It was the middle of winter and the weather was really bad and in 1977 no shops or businesses stayed open beyond 6.00pm. Mum called the police and tried to check if there was anything they could do. The police basically told her that it was too early to file a missing persons report and casually asked her how old Bijjy was. On hearing that Bijjy was sixteen he said that kids of that age skip out a lot and not to worry he would be back soon. She got very indignant and told the officer in no uncertain terms that Bijjy had never gone anywhere without letting her know. I didn't have the heart to enlighten mum at that time and remained silent. At this point the policeman basically told her that there is always a first time for everything. Bijjy came home shortly with a working computer, the Nascom tech had stayed with him until he identified and fixed the problem. I believe the problem was with the capacitors being reversed and the documentation being in error. After that day mum was never as sure of his whereabouts Once the computer was up and running he typed in a couple of games in assembler and corrected problems in the code by going through the Hex dumps. He had a blast playing a game similar to space invaders. As for me I typed in a game called Eliza which supposedly mimicked Freud. Bijjy had very fond memories of putting together the Nascom computer and often spoke about it with great nostalgia. The experience demystified computers and integrated circuits and probably encouraged Bijjy to pursue a career in electronics.