The new TV set I had ordered arrived on Thursday 12. I remember the exact date because on that day we had to evacuate the house and move 30 miles inland. Because of the Gabriela hurricane, if you remember, which came from the Caribbean, swept through the Dominican Republic, eastern Cuba, gained strength as it moved north and after devastating South Carolina wreaked havoc in the eastern seaboard from Maryland to Boston.

            But I digress. The point is, we were not home when the box was delivered. I don't know how they managed to come through, but there it was when we came back, a day later, a large box standing in the porch, apparently unharmed. 

            After settling down, we unpacked the box, made of a new waterproof light cardboard. The set was very modern, flat screen, lots of pushbuttons apart from a rather daunting-looking remote control. I was going to hang it in the living room, over the mock fireplace, but first of all we were anxious to see how it worked, so I stood it up on the low center table, plugged it (I always keep an extension cord handy) and after some trial and error, I found the correct button and turned it on.

            I have to explain that the manual enclosed with the set was written in some strange language, with a different alphabet, something like Thai or Sanskrit. I'm not an expert on these things; but the red button was the right one, and the TV set came to life immediately.

            The image was amazing! Three-dimensional without glasses! The program being shown was on a nature reserve, all kinds of strange animals roamed about. I suppose Africa still has lots of places which are being discovered only now. The audio was, as expected, unintelligible. Playing with the controls, we took a look at some of the other channels. Strangely enough, all the familiar ones were missing. Instead we went through a series of programs in different languages, none of which sounded familiar. The people, too, were outlandish. I suppose some African tribes now produce programs, which explains some huge lower lips, or the big protruding eyes. 

           I tried to contact the internet site where I purchased the TV, to ask them to send a technician to fix the problem, but then I was met with the unbelievable gall of a guy telling me that they were sorry that the delivery was delayed, but our new TV would arrive in two or three days time. I told the guy that he was mistaken, that the set was already in our possession, and it only had to be reprogrammed for our channels, and then the guy insisted it had not been delivered, and after some words back and forth, in rising tones, he cut me off.

          We were stuck with the damn thing. Beautiful pictures, 3-D all the time, but we couldn't understand a word.

          Then, all of a sudden, while playing with the remote control, I must have touched a button, and all the dialogue in the TV became intelligible, although… in Spanish! That was something, at least. Bob, who took Spanish as elective, told us that although he understood the words, many terms he did not recognize, and as a matter of fact, the dialogue was meaningless.

           I went on touching all the buttons until I must have touched again the right one, and then the language became English!

          The funny thing is, synchronization was so perfect, that it looked as if the actors were really speaking in English.

          Hearing the dialogue in our language did not help us much. Some programs were panels, discussing the politics of a foreign country which I couldn't identify. The news covered an earthquake, a storm, a new discovery in the stellar observatory. There were ads for medicines, cosmetics, some new robotic devices for the home, nothing of interest to us.

          We were tired, and decided to call it a day. I turned the set off and we all went upstairs to our respective bedrooms, Jean and I in ours, the children, Bob and Sylvia, in their own rooms.

I was awakened by a noise. As I identified it coming from the living room I became instantly alert. I always keep a baseball bat under the bed. Grabbing it, I walked on tiptoe to the banister overlooking the living room. The new TV set was on! That was too much, turning itself on in the middle of the night! I felt anger rising. I walked down and took a look at the screen. It showed a rather odd-looking person, wearing a kind of mask, who was repeating something that sounded like “Greetings” but his accent was awful. I sat on my armchair, took the remote control and tried to turn the damn machine off.  

          Instead, the masked guy looked straight at me and started speaking slowly, like when speaking to a child. I could understand most of what he said, unbelievable though it was.

“My friend,” the guy intoned solemnly, “by an unfortunate oversight, student Burrawal 2 contacted your planet in the course of his school project to contact alien societies. Yours, of course, is still under review and Student Burrawal 2 should not have sent the intergalactic communicator to your location. This was a case of gross misconduct and he will be punished accordingly. “

          He paused, as if searching for the right words.

         “The communicator will be removed as soon as I terminate this message. Please stand at least ten feet away, to avoid injury when the air rushes into the vacuum. Please excuse the inconvenience. Hopefully, your planet will resolve your current problems and then we’ll be able to contact you again.”

He peered at something out of sight; then added “Aloha, Farewell, Goodbye… ah, so many possible endings.”

          The screen went blank. I stepped back and then there was a swoosh sound as air rushed into the space occupied by the set, which had vanished.

          Fortunately, Jean and the children didn’t wake up. So the next morning I made up a story that the TV was not ours, a mistake of the delivery guys, who came back late at night and removed it.

Two days later our new TV set arrived. It took us a while to get used to watch the flat images, instead of 3-D.

          I didn’t tell anybody of the whole incident. Now, even I start to doubt it ever happened.