Please, Do Not Touch The Router. Thanks.

I almost forgot that I owe a funny story.

Before I get into it, the moral of this story is that if you treat people like idiots, they will do idiotic things. With this in mind, I’m going launch into it.

When arriving at a hostel or a hotel after along day on the road, or even a short one for that matter, it seems that most people reach for a computer or smart phone right after they drop their bags. Check the mail, check FB, check the news and check the scores. Compulsive use of technology seems to be pervasive, and I am one of the many technology addicts. Few things can draw out the dependency like deprivation.

I arrived at Iguana Azul alone (Copan, Honduras). It was very clean, quiet, and had a nice living room with complementary wi-fi. After 10h on the bus, I wanted to go for a stroll, get some fresh air and stretch the legs a bit - after I check my mail. I flipped open my computer and I had a connection for about 5 seconds before it went to the no service page. There was only one network, which has full bars and was unlocked, yet impossible to browse. Mysterious.

I should have taken a picture of the chair with the router on it. There were three signs: one taped to the router, and two taped to the backrest of the chair:

PLEASE, DO NOT TOUCH OR ADJUST THE ROUTER. THANKS

My first thoughts were: Wow, they really don’t want anybody to touch this router. I guess it must happen a lot if they need three signs. I wonder why you can’t touch it? I gave up trying to connect for the time being. I actually went on that walk I wanted to take in the first place. After the walk, I tried again, no success. After dinner, I had to move away from the living room with the router because it was frustrating me. My book offered little distraction. I started getting pangs, “I wonder if I have any notifications? New mail?”

When I went back to the computer, there had been a development. A page had loaded in the browser, it was asking for a username and password. HOPE, Hells Yeah! I sleuthed down the list in a few seconds, and I had plugged in the first combo that I found. It worked! Unfortunately, I only had about 3 minutes of good surfing until it was back to indefinite white pages. Chrome started suggesting things to me: reloading, talking to my net admin, checking DNS settings among other things and…

Reboot any routers, modems, or other network devices you may be using.

That was the seed [open in new window for ambiance]. The temptation was biblical. At that moment, I started having flashbacks, a long history of amateur wireless network troubleshooting. From the blur of memories came the tried and true “reset then retry”. Unfortunately, resetting involves touching. Little did I know…

Despite having ultimately disregarded the chair-signs - I got our Internet to work. It was fast too! I became the mini-hero of the hostel.

The next morning, the Internet was not working again. The network had changed to ‘dead’. This was odd, as well as inconvenient. Luckily I had a day of roaming planned, so I figured I could swing by an internet café and get my fix that way. During my roaming, I stopped at two restaurants and three internet cafes. None of them had Internet. They said the network was down over the whole valley, and that they hope to get it operational by evening. Later that day, I met a kiwi girl from the hostel, she said that she had just come from a place with working internet. It made it my next stop, and it was indeed working fine. So I wonder what the deal was with the Internet in the other places?

When I got home, I was going to check the Internet at the hostel. 5min after I sat down, a truck pulled up. A stout, husky American guy hopped out with a laptop in hand. He took a seat on the couch.

“What networks can your computer detect?” he asked.

“I see two, the first is called ‘dead’” I replied.

“HA! Are you connected to that one, or the other one?” he asked.

“Uh, yeah. Yeah I’m connected to ‘dead’” I said.

“Son-of-a-BIITCH!” he said, almost shouting.

He was the I.T. guy. He launched into a rant about IP, DHCP and TCP. Long story short, our hostel had the only D-link router in town. I learned that, through computer wizardry, over 50 other routers sharing our connection. To set this up, he has to give each other router a number that’s assigned to our D-link. If the D-link resets, the number the OTHER routers need to be included in the network changes, but they never get the memo. The result, resetting the hostel router cuts off 50 other routers.

I wiped out Internet in Copan for almost 24h. He had just spent his entire day going around trying to figure out WTF happened to his network. He asked me if I reset the router. I said yes [IDIOT! Plead Section 11(c) of the charter!]. He was understandably furious. I felt like an ass, ashamed and embarrassed.

After he fixed the Internet, it no longer worked.

Constructive suggestions: 1. Move the router. Out of sight, out of reach, out of mind. If the whole town’s Internet is feeding off this one router, it should be stored more securely, especially considering its implicit track-record of meddlesome gringos. Three-signs worth! 2. IFF its impossible to move the router, then at the very least, explain why to not touch it. The signs offer no justification - only categorical prohibition. If I had known what I know now, there is no way I would have touched the router. Instead of adding a fourth sign saying NO, perhaps they should post a brief explanation of WHY. Treating people like children encourages them to act like children.