It’s been almost a month since I got my own broadband connection at my apartment and until now I’m still in the middle of “unpacking the boxes”—boxed files, that is. My whole digital life is packed in one DVD and 5 CD optical drives containing old docs, photos, MP3, vids, blog templates and an unfinished Tantra Online Overlay for Friendster. Some files are hosted by online free storage spaces like Photobucket and Picasa as well.
I’ve lived without Internet connection for a year and eight months which felt like and eternity for someone who has been wired to cyberspace for three years. Of course I’ve had access to the web through the office and the Internet cafes but nothing can ever compare to having it in the privacy of your own home and without other people yelling “DAGAN!!!” as the try to rescue their DOTA characters from imminent death.
The Internet has now become something personal, something that you should have for your own and not to be a shared experience with other cafe users. I don’t know when it started, perhaps during the time when I don’t have on-demand access. Kinda reminds me of the time mom and takes me with her to a PLDT office and wait on queue as everyone takes turns to call their loved ones abroad. Now, phones are everywhere.
So, what have I missed since the last time I got Internet connection? Well, I lost track of my friends on Tantra Online, an online game that kept me up all night long before, I failed to write regularly on my blog, and I lost a lot of my online friends. But, thanks to the wonders of Facebook, I got a lot of them back. Not all yet but it’s getting there, hopefully.
It’s really amazing how logging in to a website makes you feel at home, with the people who shared a piece of your life story and still be able to continue sharing it with them. For instance, I got reunited with my grade one teacher who now is working in another country; I reconnected with Katrina Santiago and Mena Reyes who are both happily married; and mothers now with foreign last names; and, I now have tabs on my classmates who have chosen the nursing profession who’s going to, already in, planning to go to, and can’t go to the US.
Sadly, I don’t feel “at home” as much as I do when I’m on Facebook when I’m in Maasin cause it seems like all the people I know have gone somewhere else. Can’t blame them, I too left in search for new beginnings and a better job. It’s what you do when their is no other option, specially if you don’t know people. Can’t really blame anyone for life’s harsh realities. You just got to do what must be done even if it means moving away from the people and the place you’ve grown accustomed to and loved.
It’s almost Christmas and, although this will sound incoherent to the topic, I guess I could, as early as now, make a wish. I wish that people who gets to read this and knows me would add me to their Facebook friends list (facebook.com/bendzgerona). I promise to send you anything you want…through Facebook gifts. ^_~