By David Haldane

 

Nov. 24, 2025

 

 

It feels like I imagine it would to suddenly go deaf or blind. One minute you’re present and connected. And then, poof, you’re gone!

I’m not speaking of the human senses we ordinarily engage. No, what I’m referring to here is the more recent all-encompassing mechanical sense wrought by modern technology. Yup, you guessed it, the internet. Which, as you know, most of us have come to rely on as much as our natural senses and, in some ways, even more.

My own tragic bout with cyber-muteness began when the signal afforded by our long-time internet provider, PLDT, suddenly vanished. It happened on a Saturday when, as luck would have it, we were out of town. When we returned the next day eager to catch the latest news flashes, well, the only thing flashing was our modem’s red light.

“Damn,” I thought, “what are we gonna do now?”

At first, I figured it was because I’d paid the bill a day late. True to form, they’d called me immediately with a “friendly reminder” and a warning. And so I’d made a bank transfer, expecting it to register instantly. Probably, I reasoned, there’d been a delay in the transfer; surely the signal would reappear soon.

When it still hadn’t two days later, I made the first of innumerable calls to customer service. So many, in fact, that I’ve lost count. “Hello,” I said following the protracted screening by an annoying automated voice confirming my identity. “I’d like to report the complete loss of our internet connection.”

“Oh my,” a new voice-that-almost-sounded-human responded sympathetically. “We apologize for that; we’ll take care of it right away.”

Two days later we got another call, this one from a technician, also seemingly human and apparently in our neighborhood. The problem with our fiber-optic system, he explained, was a malfunctioning “box on the street, so someone will be there tonight or tomorrow.”

Two weeks after that, someone finally was.

Those weeks were filled with almost daily calls to PLDT’s customer service, two trips to the company’s Surigao City office and, believe me, lots of gut-wrenching and hair-pulling angst. Each time we called or visited, the response was the same: “Oh my, it’s been that long? We’re soooo sorry! But don’t worry, we’ll escalate your case and get someone out there tomorrow! Have a nice day.”

Eventually, they stopped answering our calls.

Let me tell you what life is like sans cyber connection. It’s as if someone has died and you’re eternally stuck at their funeral. Like somehow the earth has stopped spinning and you’re struggling not to fall off. Or a massive brownout has occurred, leaving you in pitch darkness for the rest of your life.

After a while, a sense of unreality sets in and you feel stuck in a kind of netherworld, unable to distinguish between reality and that which is imagined. You literally have no idea what’s happened in the world or what’s likely to happen next.

Okay, maybe I’m exaggerating, but only a little.

Eventually, we were able to use the hotspots on our cell phones to garner a bit of data for our laptops, desktops, and iPads. But it was intermittent, unreliable, and agonizingly slow. And so we began considering alternatives. And fantasizing about what we’d say the next time PLDT called demanding a day-late payment.

“Sure, we’ll pay,” seemed like an appropriate response. “Just as soon as you reimburse us for the time we’ve lived in limbo. And for the money we’d have made, had we been doing business online. Oh yes, and for the emotional distress you’ve inflicted through your cruel and inhuman disconnection.”

Then the technician showed up. And quickly cleaned a dirty connector. After disciplining that misbehaving box. All of which postponed the next disconnect for just under 24 hours.

But none of it matters anymore because we’ve already ordered Starlink, Elon Musk’s inspired satellite system designed to serve severely cyber-challenged regions such as ours.

Bottom line, forget PLDT; we’re reaching for the stars!

 

 

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David Haldane is an award-winning American journalist and author living in Northern Mindanao, Philippines. His latest book is Dark Skies: Tales of Turbulence in Paradise.   This column appears weekly in The Manila Times.