So, technology…
The phone that I’m using while abroad is the typical study abroad/throwaway phone, a Samsung barphone with Sudoku as the coolest feature. Typing on it takes me back to 6th grade, but the limited free Wifi in the surrounding areas makes it a necessity for communication. There is a lot of Wifi around the city, but connecting to it usually requires the ability to read Thai, which is an area in which I am severely lacking. Some people, cleverly, unlocked their smartphones before they came here, and put in a local SIM card, so that they carry around one phone and have internet access (as opposed to yours truly, who carries around barphone and iPhone.) Re-upping the minutes on the phone is very easy and can be done online. So far I’ve only had to re-up once, at 300 baht (around $8) and that typically lasts a few weeks, depending on how many phone calls and texts I make. My iPhone is a necessity because it’s a camera, in addition to a connection to the outside world on the off chance that I can find accessible Wifi. On my university’s campus, there is Wifi coverage everywhere, and my iPhone becomes my primary method of communication through Facebook, Whatsapp, iMessage, and other texting apps (the messaging app varies on the nationality of the people messaging.) My phone is also very useful in my accommodation, as the Wifi here is fairly unreliable, and it’s much easier to fumble around with it on my phone than my computer.
The rest of the technology available here is pretty standard, as we’re fortunate enough to be at a university and in nice accommodation. My room has a fridge, TV, water heater, and loads of outlets (although on day 2 I blew out all of them by stupidly trying to insert a high voltage power strip, not the best intro to my housing.) The Wifi is the biggest gripe about the technology here, even though it’s incredible that we have as much internet access as we do. In both the housing and university campus, there is a limit to how many devices one username can connect to the internet, because of the very limited bandwidth. The university campus Wifi is very reliable, and typically fast. My housing, on the other hand, is very unreliable, and it’s very normal for it to totally drop for an extended period of time. It’s very frustrating, especially when messages over the internet are my primary form of communication (with barphone as a back-up.) More frustrating than communicating with my friends is the uncertainty surrounding Skype interviews, as I have a few next week for co-op, and am currently struggling to find a private space with reliable internet. But, in the scheme of things, our internet is incredible compared to other parts of Thailand, and I am still incredibly fortunate compared to the vast majority of the Thai population.
One thing that’s a bit surprising technology-wise is the high number of high end cars. I regularly see BMW’s and Mercedes’s driving down our road, which is not in a very luxurious neighborhood. It’s likely that they are university students driving to their housing, but it’s still a surprising sight to see them driving past food stands and restaurants held up by corrugated aluminum, twine, and stepping stools.
Once you’re in Bangkok itself, technology is pretty much caught up with the west. Bangkok is where an incredible amount of Thailand’s money comes in, and a lot of their spending goes into keeping the city very up-to-date. The skytrain is very, very clean and modern, the malls are massive and some of the nicest I’ve ever been to, the sky bars have up-to-date technology and services, and most taxis are only a couple of years old. The hotels are very high end, and light up at night, often with television screens advertising products on the outside. Outside of BKK, however, the level of technology decreases very quickly and obviously, as the money doesn’t permeate the suburbs as much as the big cities.
In my day to day life, technology doesn’t really negatively affect me, with the main exception being the unreliable internet in my housing. Even though I’m not in a developing country, I’m attending an incredible university, with students that are extremely privileged to have the ability to attend. The university is almost as technologically advanced as American universities, and the students almost all have smartphones and laptops and are very comfortable with technology. The differences come out during my travels to the less populated regions, and when I interact with people that are not university students. That is where it becomes obvious that the majority of this country is not privileged enough to have access to 21st century technology, and how almost all of my interactions take place within the Mahidol University bubble. The people down the block from me, who bring out their fruit stands at night (which double as their mode of transportation- a moped with a cart attached,) who live in houses made of aluminum walls and aluminum roofs, don’t have iPhones. They don’t have televisions or iPods or brand-new laptops, and that’s the truth for a very large percentage of this country. My interactions with technology take place within the privileged few, and, while I’m trying to learn as much as I can about living in third-world conditions, take my observations with a grain of salt, because I don’t see it all, I don’t interact with the least fortunate in this country, and my upbringing blinds me to a lot of this world, and I will be the first to say that I am ignorant about the true conditions that people are living in a quarter of a mile from my air-conditioned room and internet connection. But, I’m trying to learn more, and trying to step outside of the bubble that I’m currently in.
