I wouldn't write about my ongoing struggle with internet at home if it wasn't such a singular part of my life here and an example of life in Bulgaria in general. It's back now, hopefully for a while.
I went in yesterday to change my account to a pay by the month system instead of the data transfer pay system I've been on. My internet had been out all weekend, but I assumed that changing my account would mean a reset in the their system and that my account would come up fresh. Or something like that. Anyway, I didn't mention that I had no internet.
It was still gone today. So I went back to the office and asked about it. They said it should be working, and that I no longer needed to use the virtual private network (VPN) everybody still seems to be using. I went home, tried accessing the internet without the VPN, and had no luck. So I called a Bulgarian friend who I've pestered about this internet stuff because he uses the company to and, even though it's the only legitimate ISP in Silistra, he recommended it. So he must pay.
So we both went to the office, and he was surprised to hear that, yes, we no longer needed to use the VPN. That made his day, but I still had no internet. So they said they would send a guy "sometime in the afternoon." That was at 12:00. 5 hours of waiting in my apartment later, the guy showed up. He fiddled around outside for a while and apparently reconnected a wire or two.
Yay! I had internet again. I can kind of understand a connection issue like that. I'mon the outskirts of town (more or less), and my building is filled with senior citizens, so if a wire goes down, I'm the only one that can tell the company about it.
Unfortunately, that joy went away when the connection failed again, but this time I knew it was the company's fault because I was still on the network, I just couldn't access sites outside of the network. Anyway, it's been on and off for the last few hours and I just wanted to toss this update on before it disappears again.
Posted by Rob at July 5, 2005 10:28 PM