84-year-old Japanese grandmother: An independent female IOS developer, a legendary life!

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This article is reprinted from the WeChat public account "Da Fei Code", the author is Shui Yingyue. Please contact the Da Fei Code public account to reprint this article.

In the eyes of most people, programming is a job that only young people can do. In the ever-changing Internet industry, people in the Internet industry should prepare for retirement at the age of 35.

According to data from the beginning of this year, the average age of employees of 19 domestic Internet companies is 29.6 years old, and the average age of employees of ByteDance and Pinduoduo is 27 years old.

However, there is a person who tells you with his own actions: retirement? It doesn't exist!

Maybe you will argue that this is definitely survivor bias. However, pessimists are often right and optimists are often successful.

Some time ago, when I was browsing the news, I accidentally discovered an old Japanese grandmother who truly demonstrated that "it's never too late to start, no matter how old you are." I was very inspired after reading her story.

She is the protagonist of today's story, an 84-year-old Japanese grandmother known as the "world's oldest programmer" - Masako Wakamiya, a female independent iOS developer.

Still programming at 84? Did you hear that right? That’s crazy!

That’s right! In this world, there is someone who breaks your cognition and subverts your values.

To be honest, I was attracted by the term "elderly programmer" at first. I admired her spirit of not fearing age and keeping learning until old age.

However, after reading her story carefully, I was moved by the meaning behind what she did. She is an old woman who truly treats "programmer" as a career and makes "programmer" the meaning of her life.

So, what is the life story of this 84-year-old Japanese grandmother, Masako Wakamiya?

Life is a process of constant experimentation

Perhaps, in the way most people live, when they reach retirement age, they should be surrounded by their loved ones and enjoy their old age.

However, the truly lucky life of grandma Wakamiya Masako began after her retirement.

Masako, who was born in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan, is 84 years old this year. She is not like the image of a "coder" in your imagination: she looks short, thin, and clean.

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Most people have the impression that developers are “stuck in their homes”, but Masako Wakamiya is not someone who stays at home all day long.

She likes to travel alone and has visited more than 60 countries. At the age of 84, she is still busy giving speeches, teaching, and creating works every day...

It is hard to imagine that such a rich and interesting soul and such a cool old age would probably not have been something that Masako would have even thought of at the age of 58.

"Everyone will die eventually, so why not keep trying? If you fail, it's just a waste of time and money. Even if you keep failing, you will still grow."

Wakamiya Masako said so.

It was because of her brave attempt at the beginning that everything that happened later was possible.

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From a retired bank employee to a self-taught coding enthusiast

After graduating from high school, Masako Wakamiya worked as a secretary at Mitsubishi Bank. As the first female manager of the planning department, she worked there for decades until her retirement.

In 1994, Masako retired at the age of 58 and stayed at home. But soon after her retirement, her mother became paralyzed in bed due to illness.

In order to take good care of her mother, Masako never left her side, but this also cut off her contact with the outside world.

By chance, Masako saw an advertisement in a magazine:

"If you have a computer, you can communicate with the world and chat with people without leaving your home."

This advertisement completely touched Masako. She was very excited and full of anticipation for the "new things" described in the magazine.

So she spent a lot of money to buy her first computer in her life. Unexpectedly, this "new thing" actually changed her retirement life.

In order to keep in touch with the outside world, Masako, in addition to taking care of her mother, tinkered with this "new thing".

At first, she was so excited about playing with the computer that she couldn't express it in words. But after a while, she was stunned.

In that era, laptops were still very expensive products, and very few people owned laptops, let alone had someone to help them with.

What should she do? Put it aside? But she felt sad when she thought about the money she had spent. She was eager to communicate with the outside world, so she decided to learn how to set up a computer, which was very complicated for her.

Nothing is difficult if one sets his mind to it. After tinkering for three months, Masako finally learned how to operate the keyboard and mouse, use the operating system, surf the Internet, and ask for help from other netizens through online chats...

She successfully made the computer send her a message after she woke up early - "Good morning, Masako-chan."

She experienced the joy of programming design for the first time, and at that moment, it was as if an angel had wings.

“I thought my life would not change much after I turned 60, because as people get older, they gradually lose touch with the world.

But after I turned 60, I found that my life could be so fulfilling.

This feeling makes me feel great. The Internet has given me a pair of wings and brought me to a world I didn’t know existed.”

At the age of 82, he developed a game and became Apple's "oldest programmer"

In recent years, the Internet has been advancing by leaps and bounds, subverting our traditional lives.

Technology is developing faster and faster, but Zhengzi clearly feels that almost few of his friends of the same age play electronic products.

The living conditions of the middle-aged and elderly groups are worrying. After retirement, many people become spiritually empty, lonely and boring.

The Internet brings us convenience, but sometimes it brings parents the grievance of being abandoned. Parents who were omnipotent in our childhood are now facing obstacles in the Internet age.

I don’t know how to use navigation when I go out, nor do I know how to take an online taxi. After finally learning how to shop online, I was ridiculed because I love buying cheap goods and accidentally bought fakes.

High technology is not friendly to the lives of the elderly, and there are few application services targeting the elderly.

So she found young programmers and asked them to develop some apps for the elderly. But many programmers said they were powerless: "We don't understand the preferences of the elderly at all..."

Unlike many seniors who reject/fear new technology, Zhengzi learned to use smartphones very early. She kept thinking: Why are there no games that are interesting to the elderly? Young programmers don’t understand the needs of the elderly, but I do!

So the idea of ​​developing an app came to me: “Since there isn’t one, I’ll develop one.”

People around her advised her not to bother: "You are over 80 years old, there is no need to bother.

Programming is so difficult that many young people can’t do it. You may not even be able to read the code, so how can you learn it?”

However, this time Masako's grandmother was very determined: "If I can't figure it out in one month, I will study for a year. If I can't learn it in one year, I will study for ten years.

As long as I am still old, I will definitely learn programming, and I will develop an APP suitable for us. "

With this drive, Zhengzi embarked on the path of self-taught programming.

She taught herself Apple's development language Swift; asked a young netizen for advice on issues related to iOS platform development; used Office software to create art materials...

Three years later, she actually developed a mobile game called "Hinadan" and launched it before the Girls' Day in 2017.

As soon as this game was released on the App Store, it became a nationwide hit and received numerous positive reviews.

This is a simple game based on the traditional Japanese festival, the Hinamatsuri. All you need to do is place the dolls correctly on the four-layer display rack in the game. The meaning of the dolls, which symbolize tradition, is only understood by the elderly.

Masako chose the Girls' Day as the theme so that more people can understand the traditional culture of her hometown.

After hearing about this, Apple CEO Cook contacted Masako through employees of the Japanese branch and invited her to attend the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) that year.

At the Apple Developer Conference, Cook introduced Masako Wakamiya as "the oldest Apple app developer in the world."

But a life defined

Recalling that when 84-year-old Wakamiya Masako first started working, she used an abacus as a calculation tool. Now, she has become the oldest Apple app developer in the world.

Wakamiya Masako never married in her life. Having missed her first love, she devoted all her energy to work and study.

She is a believer in "lifelong learning".

Now 84 years old, she still gives speeches and writes books around the world.

She said that with the arrival of an era when everyone can live to be 100 years old, it is important for the elderly to keep pace with the times, society, science and information technology. The elderly must relearn, among which finance and IT are particularly important.

“When you get older, you lose a lot of things: your husband, your job, your hair, your eyesight, the minuses in life are endless. But if you learn something new, whether it’s programming or playing the piano, it’s a plus and it’s an incentive.”

Hearing such insights into life, I can't help but sigh that this old lady lives a transparent and clear life.

If it is said that beautiful appearances are all the same, but interesting souls are rare, then this statement is not an exaggeration when applied to Wakamiya Masako.

“Besides my hobby of programming, I also travel around the world.”

Her past work has given her a good pension. While not worrying about the economy, she has been learning computers and keeping up with the times. She has also been traveling around the world and recording her travel experiences in her blog.

What you can see on her face is not the sadness of an older programmer, but the finishing touch of the book "Dharma Bums": forever young, always full of tears!

at last

After reading her story, I thought of myself when I first entered the workplace.

At that time, an elder in the company once said something to a few of us newbies in the workplace:

“You are now engaged in a great cause that will change the world. The names of all of you involved in the project will be displayed to the world along with our products.”

At that moment, it felt really cool.

Later, I discovered a cruel "truth":

The products we develop will eventually be eliminated by the market;

Some products have even been strangled in the cradle before they were even released;

The code we write will eventually be abandoned;

Our name won't even appear in the product manual, let alone be mentioned by others...

For a while, I was confused. Apart from obtaining material satisfaction, what is the meaning of the work we do?

As I grow older and gain more life experience, I gradually realize that everything we do now may not be able to move the earth or change the world.

However, as long as it can improve our lives little by little and make the world a better place, just like the projects we have participated in, even if it is eventually abandoned by the market,

But as long as its existence has benefited more users and helped people in need, then our efforts will be meaningful.

As it is written on the inscription in Westminster Abbey:

As I lay dying, it suddenly occurred to me: If I had only changed myself first, then as an example, I might have changed my family. With their help and encouragement, I might have done something for my country. And who knows? I might even have changed the world.

If "programmer" exists simply as a profession, then no matter what profession it is in the world, it will have its so-called career, and will be limited by factors such as age and workplace;

However, if you treat it as a "career" and give it meaning in life, then it will be unlimited and not afraid of age.

As Masako's grandmother said, "You don't have to be a professional technician to develop mobile applications. If you have creativity and dreams, you should work hard to realize them."

There is only one kind of success in this world, and that is to live your life the way you want.

Let’s encourage each other!