Monday, January 15, 2007

Taiwan, Internet, & my apartment

What happened to Richard?
Well, it all started with an earthquake. If you're reading this from inside the U.S., you might not have even heard about it. Taiwan had a pretty big earthquake and one of the results is that most of the underwater internet cables were severely damaged. These cables form the main link from Asia to the U.S..... To make the story short, I (and many others) are now having trouble accessing anything, email and blogger included. Could be worse - I could have been living in Taiwan and had my home & everything I own destroyed!

... One strange thing however. My internet is ADSL through China Telecom (the largest provider). All others here with that same service seem to be sharing the problem of internet connectivity. A friend nearby has broadband service through China Unicom. His service didn't get worse with the earthquake....is there a method to this madness?


Here's the first few long-overdue photo's of my apartment. Two from when I was first moving in, and one taken from the balcony a couple of days ago. When things get cleaned up I might post a couple of the place with furniture in it. :)

(Living Room - it's Huge!)

(My really small kitchen)

(View from my balcony)

2 comments:

Elizabeth J. said...

Hey, Richard. Welcome back. I'm also in Kunming, and I also have China Telecom and experiencing the same internet problems although recently it seems a little better. Where's your apartment? It looks really nice! -- Elizabeth, elizabethinchina.com

Richard in Kunming said...

Hi Elizbeth. You're the first China Telecom user that I've heard that from. The way things have been I could almost thing that the service had nothing to do with the earthquake - but that would be too much coincidence.

The apartment is at Splendid Gardens, jin3 yuan4 hua1 yuan2. It's on Guanan Lu, near the airport. Not bad, huh? :)