Essay Finished
Where Next?
Bob Williams
Sun 1 Jun 2014 11:53
Weather: sunny, warm
I had the essay finished this morning, not exactly spit and polished, but
adequate and ready to be uploaded. The only problem was that this morning my
pocket wi-fi decided to stop working. I suspect the contract has expired
which in a way is a good thing as I was worried that when I leave Japan that
the internet company might continue to charge me without me knowing. So I
was not too fussed about this little glitch. Wajima looked like a bit of
tourist town and while not large, it seemed to have all the essential
services, which I assumed would include an internet service of some
description somewhere, I thought the best place to try first up would be the
tourist information centre, which turned out to be a good guess as the lady
at the counter said there was a free wi-fi service in the centre. She kindly
allowed me to sit at a desk and I got down to business.
Here my hopes for uploading the essay and making good use of the rest of the
day were dashed, like a ship upon the rocks, or like a Sylph upon an Asya.
The free wi-fi service, Free Spot, is a particularly weird set up which I
won't go into all the details about, but suffice to say I got ten minutes
use out of it and was unable to get any further access. There was an
alternative pay as you go service also available, which is quite reasonable
and I had used it before, but here came another problem. Because I had used
it before and my account had expired it would not let me log on using my old
account name and it would not let me use my credit card to create a new log
on because it would take me back to the old log on. This was now getting a
little frustrating. I had pulled into Wajima specifically to get the essay
out of the way and I was being foiled at every turn. I asked the tourist
centre staff if there was an internet cafe or other wi-fi network anywhere
in town but she told me no. Meanwhile the net book's battery was losing
charge, and, at an inversely proportional ratio to the net book's battery
meter, I was feeling the pressure mounting.
I had spent over two hours trying to find a solution, but ended up defeated.
Fortunately the tourist office lady, witnessing my frustration and realising
that my mission was of some importance to me, allowed me to connect to the
internet using their land line. Even here there were further troubles, and
my battery meter was getting lower and lower. The lady fiddled around with
something, I know not what, and all of a sudden I was in the world wide web.
Good grief, what a world it is!
T'is done. Time to focus on the voyage ahead.
All is well.