Internet and telephone update

There are aspects of living out here in the Italian countryside that remind one daily of that very fact – that we’re living out in the countryside. It’s been 17 months since I arrived here. We still don’t have a fixed-line phone at home, let alone a snail’s-paced internet connection. Here’s a microcosm of how it affects our lives on a regular basis.

In my daily trip to the internet point (which is open daily from 9:30-1, and 3:30-8, closed Thurs afternoon), I made an attempt to buy an air ticket to South Africa for mid-March. Halfway through, I was asked for my passport number, which, of course, was at home. So instead of simply walking over to my filing cabinet to get it and continue (if I had the internet at home), I had to wait until the next day. I got all the way through the reservation the next day, only to find that my US credit card rejected the transaction, requiring me to call my bank and ask them what the problem was. But instead of reaching for the phone next to my desk, I had to go into Tolentino – 20km in the opposite direction from the internet point – to make the call, since the charges to do so from a cell phone would be prohibitive.

I duly go and do so, clear up the matter, and call back the airline to complete the reservation i.e. process the payment on my now-cleared credit card. Sorry, they can’t do it – the reason wasn’t clear, but, given my experience of how quickly and easily things get bunged up here, I accept it rather than push them to do something destructive, and ask what I need to do. Make another reservation, they say. Can I do such a thing over the phone? No, I need to do it online. So now instead of walking over to my desk and the computer, I have to drive 20km back to the internet point to make a new reservation. Only now it’s closed, and so I’ll have to wait until tomorrow.

The measure of the temperature in my writing doesn’t begin to reflect the rapidly rising heat that all of this ignited. But that’s all past now. I have my ticket, 2 days later instead of 2 hours. I’m just thankful that I was able to get the ticket at the same bargain price. So I suppose I shouldn’t complain – with each trip I was driving through the beautiful Italian countryside, notwithstanding the fact that I was doing so past homes with telephones and internet connections.

We’re now on our 4^th or 5^th application for a telephone with TelecommItalia (TI). The penultimate one was simply cancelled by TI after they were not able to determine where the telephone line on our property came from (yes, this is the very telephone institution that installed it). And then when we reapplied, they connected us with a year-old application for the house we were renting back then. Every time we speak with them, they ask why we’re changing the address of our application. They even called us twice to ask why we want the telephone at 31 Regnano instead of 27 Regnano.

They’ve told us a technician will be calling us soon. I’m not holding my breath.

The simplest solution to an internet connection is, of course, through TI’s ADSL service. A friend down the road set it up himself and it’s working wonderfully for him. But having to work through TI every time there’s an issue seems to me to be a brazen request for high blood pressure, and so I’m looking for alternatives. They’re not encouraging.

Our closest town, Colmurano, have – unlike all their surrounding villages – opted not to lay in TI’s optic fibre lines so that everyone can get broadband internet. They’ve even snubbed the approach of the local computer outfit (where I go for my daily internet fix) to erect a tower so that everyone can get wireless access. That’s because the mayor – a not insignificant position in these reaches – has struck a sweetheart deal with a company some 40km distant to upgrade the town’s computer setup for free if he goes with their broadband offering.

On paper, not bad. Only the company wants a minimum number of subscribers in order to do it, and, needless to say, the potential subscribers – being tech-novice, skeptical rural Italians – want to see evidence of a working service before they’ll subscribe. The fact that over 130 locals signed the initial petition asking for the service seems now to be irrelevant – they want ink-dried signatures.

So it’s a stalemate. I should have known not to get all hopeful when I attended the late-night meeting some 3 months ago, where, after 2-plus hours of wanton waffling, I discovered that they would start the process within the next ten months … once they had the minimum number of subscribers. Ten months???? What are they going to do, mine the ore and turn it into steel themselves? Even in this neck of the woods, that timeframe astounded me. And I know it was an optimistic estimate, as all such things around here are.

So – back to the internet point I go on a daily basis. I ask them what I can do. They say I need to be able to see one of their towers, and since I’m in a dip on the side of a hill, Colmurano is the only direct option for me. However, someway up my driveway, it is possible to see San Ginesio and its towers. What of that? It turns out that there are 2 more-expensive-than-normal options. (1) Put the receiver on a pole up the driveway, and run a network cable from the receiver to the house. Only problem is, the network cables don’t work beyond around 100m. How far would the receiver be from the house? You guessed it – 100m, or just a smidgen over that. (2) Install a set of 3 antennae – one picking up the signal from San Ginesio, one to take that signal and beam it to the house, and one on the house to pick up the signal. Needless to say, the extra two antennae are not cheap.

So we’ll probably give (1) a try first. Am I hopeful? I know I need to be – these things, like horses and other beasts upon which we are sometimes totally dependent, have an aptitude for sniffing out fear, skeptism, despair, and other negative emotions, and providing their in-built, exacerbating responses. In other words, history has now taught me that any hint in my thinking that it will not go well, and ... well, draw your own conclusions.

The other vital thing, as I’ve also learned, is to figure out all the questions to ask, and ask them. It seems to be a human law here that information is only given when requested. It could be vital, pivotal, fundamental, core – it doesn’t matter, unless you ask, ye shall not receive. It’s not malicious, or premeditated, or negative in any way, it’s just the way it is.

Our challenge, then, is to figure out all the questions that we don’t have the slightest clue we should ask. And on this score I suppose I should express some gratitude – who would have thought that out here in the rolling hills of Italy, wallowing back in the 1950’s, I’d be taken to brainstorming, lateral thinking, and open-minded blue-skying on a routine basis. I guess sooner or later (more than likely later, much later) I’ll finally figure out how to take my flash-point blood temperature and soothe it to the point that I’ll achieve the calmness that I came for in the first place. After all, everyone else around me has managed it …