Rediscovering the grid (while trying to escape it)
I spent the last 10 days looking for adventure in an exotic land. This was no resort vacation and daily comforts that I tend to take for granted were few and far between. The places I visited had unusual food, bad plumbing, limited electricity and ancient customs that hold true till today. It was exciting, disorienting, and strangely liberating at the same time.
Getting away from it all not only helped me get a renewed perspective on the over-connectedness and tedium of modern life, but also how modem media and communications technologies were transforming lives in remote corners of the world. It helped me develop a renewed appreciation of the promise that new technology offers. It also made me realize that the technophiles folly lies in not being satisfied by how we can be enriched by technology and instead letting ourselves get consumed by it.
My attempts to disconnect from modern life and modern technology were fairly successful, but as I traveled deeper through valleys and mountains, sand dunes and ancient castles, I realized how modern technology was ironically playing a key role in this whole journey. I wouldn’t have found my adventure tour operator if it wasn’t for the Internet and most of the coordination that was making my challenging trip possible was being done over cell phones.
While hiking through a dusty valley in the scorching heat, we ran into a tribal boy on a donkey. He offered to make us tea and we obviously welcomed the break. As we watched him pick sage and blend it into a fragrant brew, he explained how he lived in a tent in the valley with no electricity or modern comforts…then his cell phone rang. My fellow hikers and I raised our eyebrows and chuckled; as the tribal boy went on to explain (and our guide translated) how his cell phone played a crucial role in his life. It allowed him to stay connected to his tribesmen across the valley (and I suspect, also find out if there were any weary hikers heading in his direction). The next day, I spent hours riding a camel through the desert. In the middle of the journey, my tour guide started quizzing me about the merits of the iPhone vs the Blackberry. He explained how cell phones had changed the tour business in his country, from tour operators to the camel handlers, who were now able to take last minute bookings and be available to do business any time the need arose. During a lunch break in the middle of the desert, I showed him my iPhone and described various features that he had only heard of but never actually seen. I watched as he excitingly played around with it and discussed how great it would be to not only make phone calls, but also access email while he was on the road.
On the last day of my trip, we trekked across sandy mountains and didn’t see another human for miles. My guide suffered an unfortunate tumble on the steep rocks. His cell phone slipped out of his hand and shattered on the jagged sandstone. Luckily, he escaped with only minor bruises. I watched him stare dejectedly at his broken phone and asked him how he would make it through the day without it (since so much of his business depended on it). He laughed and replied “I’m still here and unhurt — and so are you. The phone was just a phone. Maybe that was the mountains way of reminding me what really matters”.
I smiled, thanked the mountain and held on tight to my iPhone.
