I know people enjoy reading posts that involve an element of whinging so here is the first one for starters….
It’s been a couple of years since I have been to Bali for any real period of time and the island has barely crept forward in terms of online access.
Internet access is still a nightmare here for the tech nomad and would be the key reason why I could not stay here long enough to be called an expat.
Many places around offer free wifi with their over priced posh coffee but I have yet to find one place where the connection is good enough for me to forget about the hovering staff who, in great numbers, continue to hassle you to buy a stale sandwich after indicating that you only want to drink.
Internet cafe owners still think windows 98 is cutting edge and that broadband speed is dial up x 2.
Apart from the super expensive hotels, no other accommodation seems to offer wifi which is something I have come to expect in most parts of the world now. Even if they advertise wifi it is normally broken.
3G mobile is working in Bali but getting the required equipment is virtually impossible. I do have it on my mobile phone but it is painfully slow and I cannot do much with no keyboard and a small screen.
I guess what is kind of annoying is that Bali has a highly developed tourist industry, cutting edge food outlets and most other trappings of modern life to satisfy the touring hoards, but the Internet here remains in the time when Oasis were good.
Of course the silver lining is that I am not on the Internet much at all and I am doing things outdoors that means my decreasingly pasty complexion is not deflecting the suns’ rays back into the stratosphere as much as usual.
So why I am whinging at all about the Internet here? I don’t know really. I just fancied a little whinge. 😉