My European Travel Diary (014): What a difficult time online in Amsterdam

When I was in Amsterdam I had a difficult time online.

At about 9 pm on the 30th Sept 2000 we went to our hotel in Amsterdam. It was quite big and offered Internet access via the TV in the rooms. I was very pleased about this and tried to get on the Internet at 10 pm. However, the TV remote control and the keyboard stopped working after just three key presses. I thought “no way!” and called reception where a man told me that they would send someone to deal with it. After 15 minutes had passed and no one had come, I took the remote and the keyboard to reception. I found the person who had took my call but he said that he couldn’t resolve the problem there so he came to my room to try it on the TV.

Can you guess what the problem was? There was no power in the batteries! The keyboard still didn’t work and the man apologised and went away. Anyway, I was determined to do some work so I checked everything again. Finally I found what the problem was, can you imagine? The batteries in the keyboard were fitted the wrong way round! I could not help but smile at this and tried to access the Internet, it was already 11 pm.

I never thought that the keyboard would be more difficult to use than the one in Paris. Also, there was a touch screen and mouse, which was only 2 cm round and so I could only use one finger to move it. The pointer didn’t follow my finger very often.

I kept trying, and finally I managed to open my inbox and read some emails. However, I couldn’t write anything online, as soon as I did the computer crashed. I found this to be very strange and tried over and over again. I found I could write on another web site and move the email to my inbox. I was so glad to have made this “great discovery!” However, after I had written a few words the TV reminded me that my session was over, it was now 1 am….. Wow! My God!

I had to buy a telephone card in the morning so that I could make some international calls, then I had to finish because it was time to leave Holland for Germany. Even now I still have a telephone card from Holland with 60 Dutch Guilders on it and some money that relates to trying to work online in Amsterdam!

--Shirley

Written on 25th.,Doc.2000

Edited on 14th.,Oct.,2004