Technophobe

I have always considered myself fairly up-to-date with technology ... not with the very newest and latest things on the market but not far behind.

One of the reasons we have our blogs and the Beckwith's Big Adventure Facebook Page, is so that we can attempt to keep up with everything that is part of modern day living for a large majority of the world nowadays! And so that later on in life, we can make sure the munchkins aren't out of touch either. It seems however, in spite of my attempts to stay at least a little bit in touch, that the missionary lifestyle is beginning to turn me into a technophobe! 

When we got back to the UK just before Christmas, we got out our UK mobiles to stay in touch with people while we were driving around visiting (our US ones won't work here and vice versa). As we're not in the country long, we use pay-as-you-go and not long after we got back we were in a situation where I had no credit on my phone, so I thought I'd ring up and add some like I used to do in the States.

The networks had changed since we were last home and I've never had anything but a contract phone in the UK ... so this posed an issue! I found a contact number on line, which turned out to be wrong but someone in that office pointed me in the right direction. I then called up and got through to an automated system who suggest I talk to an operator (thank goodness I thought), as I was being connected the automated system kindly informed me that I didn't have enough credit for the call!! That was OBVIOUS ... I was trying to add some, I knew I didn't have any! 

So, we were left in the position of, me having no credit and Mark having no charge left on his phone, with a few important calls to make! It all seemed highly ridiculous to me that we would both be that 'out of touch', to get ourselves into that kind of position in the first place, in this day and age! But it left me feeling very middle-aged and simple ... how I imagine the older generation or missionaries who've been out in the middle of nowhere to be when faced with 'modern technology' ... not me and my family!

Where we were living in the States was in a cell-phone dead zone and technology in a lot of cases was a lot more backwards (and more expensive) than here in the UK ... a culture shock to us, as it was not what we'd expected at all! Ironically, now we're moving to Africa, we're transitioning into somewhere that is way more technologically advanced than small town Ohio and we're having to get our acts together and understand a whole lot more. 

I won't let it beat me ... but right now I have to admit I do feel like a proper old fuddy-duddy!