This post might contain some anger, and babbling about internet. Feel free to skip it.

So, we have been without internet since we got to our site. This is to be expected in a remote valley of a third-world country. I looked into satellite internet, and it’s out of my budget when I earn only $200 a month. However, both cell providers in Guatemala (Tigo and Claro) promise cellular internet in the near future, so I was hoping for that.

A few weeks ago, we made the 5-hour trip to Huehue to talk to Claro about thier internet. Yep, they have 3G broadband and sell iPhones. Yay. But, you only get coverage in the capitol. Grr, that is annoying and a show stopper. So, we went into the Tigo regional office to talk to them. They promised internet in September. Encouraging, but I didn’t believe a word of it- everything is late in Guatemala. “Will it cover our remote area?” I asked.

“Sure!” the salesman said. “If you can get Tigo phone signal, you can get the internet too.” Our signal is strong here, so that’s a good sign.

“What papers do we need? Can we use an american credit card?” Emily asked.

“American credit cards are ok. You just need three month’s statements for the contract, and your passport.” the lady replied.

So, Emily double-checked these requirements, and we went home.

As we passed through Huehue in the dying days of August, we checked in again at the Tigo office. Lo and behold, they have cellular modems in boxes behind the counter! Joy! I asked if we could buy one, and they said, “No, we cant sell them until the first of the month.” Somewhat annoying, but we had to go back through Huehue to get home on the first, so we’ll be back.

On the first, we returned to find that we’d been lied to a bunch. The lady wanted a cedula (local ID card), a water bill, a Guatemalan bank account…. “Wait a minute,” I said, “we were in here a few days ago, and you didn’t tell us any of this.”

“You must have spoken with someone else,” she said.

Emily started to get mad. “No, it was you. You were wearing a pair of heart shaped earrings with red in the middle. You own a pair like that, don’t you?”

The lady looked away. “You have to have those things for the contract.”

We hung around for about half an hour bickering with them, explaining that we don’t have cedulas becuase we’re not Guatemalans, and we don’t have a water bill because everyone in our town drinks out of a stream. We eventually got them to back down on the cedula, and by dumb luck, we had our bank statements from our Guatemalan bank accounts with us. But they said we had to have a water or electricity bill, even if we got it from a neighbor. We just couldn’t budge them. Both of us wanted to reach over the desk and strangle the lady.

So, we made the 5-hour return trip empty-handed. A week later, Emily had to go through Huehue (another 5 hour trip) to go to a meeting. She took a copy of our neighbor’s electricity bill with her. Nope, not the right bill, they told her. It says “electricity bill” at the top, but doesn’t have the electric company’s name and logo. By now we’re wondering how long this will go on. I got the “right” bill from a different neighbor, took the bus 40 mins into Santa Eulalia, and faxed it to Emily.

She went back to Tigo the next day. Apparently, the paperwork is finally right. Can we have our modem please? “No, we have to send it all to the capitol to have them confirm it. You can come back in a week.” By now, we have like 20 hours of travel invested in this crap, with 10 more to go- at least. But then, as Emily was leaving, the best part happened. One of our other Peace Corps buddies who is fighting the same fight mentioned that he saw a coverage map, and my site wasn’t on it. “Is this true?” Emily asked.

“Yes,” they replied. “But you can get coverage in Huehue, and we will be adding your site eventually.”

I am at the end of my rope. And the best part? We asked them to process us anyways. We are so desperate for internet, that we will settle for paying for something we can only use one or two times a month, for an indefinate length of time until they make it available where we are. I can well imagine that it will get here in 2010, about a week before we move back to the US.

A business like this would survive about a week in the US, but in Guatemala, it’s standard fare. They make the License Branch look like an efficient, first-class operation. If i survive all this, i will be the most laid back easy going American on the continent when I return.