Yay For Internet, Boo For Brain!

After a few days of no internet, and admitting that, however hard I wished, technology rarely repairs itself, I took matters into my own hands. I called my ISP’s customer service.

“Hi, I am having a problem with my Internet connection.”

“What seems to be the problem?”

“Well my modem seems to have stopped working.”

“I understand, let’s see if we can figure out whats wrong…”

[5 minutes later]

“Well that seems to have done it. for some reason, my settings were incompatible with the modem after an upgrade. Thanks for helping me change them, that’s seemed to work.”

This was the conversation I wish I had had. Instead I didn’t call them because my Japanese phone skills are deplorable. Customer service Japanese uses a slew of words I don’t know, and I get stuck at the part where you have to press a button after being given a list of options to choose from. I never understand any of them.

So I freak out and hang up.

My actual phone conversation was with my trilingual friend, Ting-Ting, and went something like this:

“Ting-Tiiiiiiiing!”

“Hey Aaron, whats wrong?”

“My internet wont woooooooork! It’s been out for four days!”

“Wow, mine works fine. Have you gone to the shrine like we talked about and said your New Years prayers?”

“Not yet.”

“You really should go. Your luck has been awful this year, la?”

“Tell me about it”

“Did you call customer service?”

“No”

“Why not?”

“Because I can’t understand the menus.”

audible sigh “Do you want me to call?”

“…yes”

“OK, fine. I’ll come over tomorrow, but you owe me…again.”

Tomorrow came and Ting-Ting graciously picked me up from school and called my ISP. Within five minutes, my internet was up and running. Though I couldn’t hear the tech, the conversation went something like this…

“Hi, I’m having problems connecting to the internet."

…

“Well, the modem turns on but the link light is off.”

…

(To me) “Have you moved the modem recently?”

“Yes, I thought I might have damaged the cord when I moved it though so I already bought a new $10 chord and tried it out but it didn’t work.”

“…but did you change the plugs?”

“No, I… wait, oh my god!… The cable. I’m trying to get the internet from my fax machine! I'm an idiot!”

(to me) “Yes. I agree”

(to tech guy) “I’m sorry, my friend was the problem, thank you very much, sorry about the inconvenience.”

… (Sounds of laughing from the tech)

In my defense the cables were colored incorrectly. However, if one wanted to counter my defense, one could remind me that I purposely switched the color of the cables four months ago because of their lengths.

After first threatening to throw me out the window of my apartment and then retracting the threat on the grounds of insufficient height, Ting-Ting suggested I return my computer science certificate. To say she was mad is an overstatement though, I am certain she was giddy to have ample retaliatory ammo for the next time know-it-all Aaron starts making fun of her.