My mother knows five languages, and English isn’t her first. She grew up speaking Teochew, what seems to me like a far-off, exotic language — perhaps because I don’t understand it. Along the way, she picked up a couple of others. These were also exotic, and also beyond my level of comprehension. Then, somewhere along that long road, there was English.

My mother switches back and forth easily, from phone calls to her Teochew-speaking mother, to lunches with her Cantonese-speaking in-laws, from conversations with Hokkien food vendors in their roadside stalls, to me — English-speaking, English-thinking, barely bilingual me.

It’s sort of amazing. I constantly wonder how a brain can store so much information, and if there are different little drawers for each language. Perhaps a little brain minion pulls these drawers out every time you need a language change, and some brain minions are just more active than others are. Mum’s, I think, is in constant overdrive, pumped up on intravenous caffeine, switching gears like clockwork as one language morphs into another. Mine’s just lazy, and probably a little bit of a slob too.

But there’s one language that my mother can’t seem to learn, and it’s a language that most mothers, however linguistically talented, can’t seem to either: the ever-mysterious language of the Internet revolution. There are mums with AOL emails, mums who try to use “LOL,” mums who wonder if “g33k” is a different kind of Morse. Our mothers just don’t seem to understand the nuances and subtleties of the information age, where shorthand has been shortened to the effect of castration and our brains have been wired to assimilate a new, constantly changing lexicon of words.

My mother is quite the same. With her, however, the problem actually began with the invention of computers. I still remember trying to teach my mother how to type on a Word document more than a decade ago. The concept of “backspace” was elusive, and so, apparently, was the idea of a mouse. My mum would flip out every time the screensaver came on, as if it were some kind of suspicious, hallucinogenic device placed there by an alien seeking world dominion. I can’t even begin to count the times she would look at me, quite forlornly over her first Word document, desperately wishing that it were still the Dark Ages. She would give up light bulbs and microwaves if she didn’t have to press another “enter” key, turn on another monitor or deal with another hallucinogenic alien trap.

When the Internet came around, it was déjà vu. I don’t think my mum really understood the instant pleasure of online shopping, or the addictive quality of instant messaging. I didn’t even know if she could email, a fact that was most troubling as I prepared to board my 20-hour flight across the Pacific for Stanford. With a huge time difference, emails seemed to be the only way of keeping in touch.

Necessity, thankfully, is the mother of invention, and my mother is beginning to learn. She sends me an email a day, a daily paragraph of news, and it’s quite like receiving a digest from Postcards From Yo Momma (http://postcardsfromyomomma.com). Like Postcards From Yo Momma’s emails that read, “So you know about my experience with the goose and the raccoon last night,” or “I went to a plastic surgeon yesterday to talk about Brenda’s and my droopy eyelids and my many chinz,” my mum too has her own brand of hilarity.

Out of the 205 emails my mother has sent me so far (all titled “hi” or “From mom”), here are some of my favorites.

A warning against narcissism: “Sometimes, instead of talking about yourself it is interesting to ask about [other people].”

On eating healthy: “Told dad your jean size — he says you are catching up with him.”

On my fear of caterpillars: “Earlier, at the Goldhill bus-stop, I saw a lady flicking a green caterpillar off her body. It landed on the concrete seat and started crawling. The trick is to stay cool and not be alarmed if ever one land[s] on you while in Stanford. Always be prepared, but hope it won’t happen. Keep your spirits up!!”

Encouraging me to lose my dignity for the rest of my Stanford career: “Looks like it is raining again in Stanford. Do you wear your poncho or carry umbrella when you ride your bike?”

A random string of wisdom: “Love the photos of the cute cats and seal!! Good to take up yoga but remember your time management.”

On safety: “Good to buy the new bike, as I can imagine the frustration of riding a lousy bike with brake and gear not functioning well. Happy peddling!!”

It must be all the exclamation marks, or perhaps just the fact that she’s my mother. The Internet probably still eludes her, and I think all technology overwhelms her. But when you get an email telling you that your parents are thinking of you(!), to have a great day(!!) and that your mother, however far away, still LOVES YOU(!!!), it’s impossible not to be happy.