How to conquer the world

(We don’t need tanks and gun for war. Bringing down the internet across a country would be all is needed to take to a region down.)

“The internet is down,” was one of my husband’s first words to me Saturday morning, 8 days ago. So was the television. Scary words for people who use the internet almost constantly.

I didn’t need to dress to go upstairs to check with my landlady. There is no real barrier between apartments. She was in the process of thanking the departing Swisscom man, who was telling her that it was the whole neighborhood because of a bad cable.

When will it be fixed?

Who knows? Monday was given as the latest. 

They lied.

There was a period we would go off-grid one day a week. BY CHOICE!  There was a certain peace not being connected to the world. We didn’t need to know about the latest political crisis in any number of countries. If the crisis was with friends or family, they could telephone us. Slowly we let the off-grid day become off-grid hours then back to normal.

We’d already planned to spend the day out—lunch and a museum. A faint hope that the internet would be repaired on our return was dashed as they were subsequent days as we checked the system periodically.

How different our lives are without the internet.

As I write this, I cannot check any facts, Facebook, upload photos for my friends to see, play my computer games, check out the latest news flash. We’ve proven I don’t need to know anything about the latest U.S. political farce, French strikes, Brexit this very second. During the weekend, Rick’s business emails were far less in number, more so as the week progressed. At least the mobile allowed him to stay on top of them.

I’m grateful that I no longer publish a newsletter. Back then even on weekends 20-30 emails filled my mailbox compared to the 50-100 each weekday. Now they are limited to friends and family. Catch up worries would abound if that were still the case.

I finished one book, Swiss Spy, and decided which one I would read next. Reading is part of my non-internet life even when it works. I’d already 3,900 pages in January. With my continued reading, I walked through the streets of Geneva the year I was born, strolled through the the Shlössplatz in Stuttgart, worried about Claire being stalked by Rafe, met with the Jane Austen book club as I finished one book and started on another. It was going from world to world -- none with the internet.

Monday morning, there was a note on the stairs between our flat and out landlord’s. "Swisscom is working on it." Later in the day my landlord told me to leave the TV set on per Swisscom’s instructions. I didn’t need the message on the screen saying “no signal” – I knew.

My former housemate and good friend made her house and wifi available to us two internet refugees. 

My landlords went to Swisscom to get two 3G boxes so we could get intermittent wifi as the company was working on the big problem. Only one worked, but our landlords made a second trek for a working box.

It is now 2 February, Groundhog day and no internet. I do not understand why a huge telecoms company can't get its act together. Or maybe we are under attack and because our wifi is limited we just haven't heard.