How I Explain APIs to My Grandma 👵🏻(Hint: Bodegas)

So there I was, sitting in my grandma’s kitchen, trying to explain what I do for work. Again.

She squinted at me over her glasses and asked, “So… you work with computers, right? But not fixing them? And not building them? But… something?” 🤨

That was my cue. This wasn’t my first rodeo.

I took a deep breath, took a sip of lukewarm coffee, and said the magic words:

“Okay, Grandma. Imagine you’re at your favorite bodega. 🐈‍⬛”

🏪Bodega Logic 101

If you live in a city (especially New York)🗽, you already know that the bodega is a sacred institution. It’s always open, it has everything from cat food to batteries to oddly specific hot sandwiches, and somehow the person behind the counter knows your name and your usual order.

So I told my grandma: imagine you walk into your corner bodega and ask for your usual. A bacon, egg, and cheese on a roll. Maybe a coffee, light and sweet.

You don’t go behind the counter. You don’t make the sandwich yourself. You just make the request - and like magic, the sandwich appears. The bodega guy does all the work behind the scenes. You get exactly what you asked for without having to understand the kitchen, the grill, or how the cheese melts just right.

“That’s what an API does,” I said. 

The Tech Translation 💻

APIs - short for Application Programming Interfaces - are basically the way two computer programs talk to each other. One app (like your weather app) makes a request (“Hey, what’s the forecast for today in Brooklyn?”), and another system (like a weather database) responds with the info.

😔But your app doesn’t have to know how the database works. Just like you don’t have to know how to run a grill to order your sandwich. You make the request in a language both sides understand, and voilà - data delivered, sandwich wrapped, happiness ensues.

🤯Why It Stuck 

My grandma nodded. “So... the API is like me asking the bodega guy for what I want?”

“Exactly. 💡”

“And he knows what to do, so I don’t have to go behind the counter?”

“Exactly.💡”

“And sometimes he even gives me a free banana?”

“Okay, that’s not part of the metaphor, but yes. Let’s say that’s a bonus feature.”

She got it. Genuinely got it. And not in the "I'm nodding to move this along" way. She later explained APIs to my uncle at a family barbecue, and used the same metaphor. (Proudest moment of my career so far.)

Why This Matters ✨

We throw around tech jargon like candy - APIs, endpoints, REST, JSON - and forget that most of the world doesn’t speak that language. But everyone understands bodegas. Or coffee shops. Or libraries. Or any space where you ask for something and get it without having to know all the messy steps in between.

Good tech isn’t just about building useful things. It’s about making those things understandable - human, even.

So next time someone asks you what an API is, skip the acronyms. Start with a sandwich. 🥪

– The Cat Cache Team 🐾
P.S. Yes, our grandma now wants her own API. We told her it’s just called texting us.