Internet...

Well, we have had many inquiries as to our internet status at home so we figured we should probably post something about our progress. As of yet, we don't have internet at home. There are really two choices in terms of internet here. You can get a wired connection...either DSL or dial-up...or a wireless connection. Most people are familiar with the DSL/Dial-up option but I really had not heard much about wireless until I got to Africa. With wireless, they come to your house and put up a small antenna which they then point at one of a number of transmitters/receivers in the area..typically on one of the hills around town. The up side is that there is no wiring to be done. The downside is that bandwidth is usually pretty low, at least when compared to DSL. In my limited experience, it is usually to slow for Skype. So, we obviously wanted to go with DSL. After talking to a couple of internet providers they informed us that we needed to talk to BTC (Botswana Telecommunications Corporation) about getting a line run from the street into our house. So, we went to BTC. They informed us that they would be happy to run a line in for us but that there might be a bit of a wait. How long? 6 months to a year.
So, our new plan is to try to get wireless out there. I would expect about a year long contract with the wireless so about the time that the wireless contract runs out we ought to have our landline run in and at that point we can make a choice. If the wireless is too slow we can switch to DSL. If wireless is cutting it for us we can just leave it alone. In any case, I am guess we are looking at at least a couple of weeks before we have any sort of regular internet at home.