My family and friends are scattered all over the world, but in this modern world, technology and internet have helped us to shorten the distance and make communication easier among us although we live in different parts of the world. This is my primary reason why I have an account with Facebook, Twitter, Multiply, Yahoo Messenger, MSN, and any other social networking sites. I need to stay in touch with my family and friends, especially with my immediate family. My high speed internet connection is my best friend especially when it is teamed up with my iPhone & iPad. So, I really have no problem to reach almost every one in the world.
For those who don't like to use social networking websites to communicate, there's always email, phone or sms.
But, unfortunately, the other sides that I communicate with, many of them do not have good access on the internet because the country doesn't have a good infrastructure for the high speed broadband connection or also because the cost to have an internet connection or a smartphone is still too expensive for them. My parents, for example. My parents are retired and they live on pension income which is very little because my dad was only a teacher before he retired. My mom was a teacher too before she retired, but she doesn't get pension money because she was only a contractual teacher. So, with only less than US$100 a month to survive, my parents won't have enough budget to buy a smartphone, a computer, or to install an internet connection. The same thing happens with my brother. My brother has a smartphone but he can't afford to buy the internet package for his smartphone. So, as you can see, I have a broken telecommunication with my immediate family. Annnnnnddddd....to make matter worst, for unexplained reason, my smartphone provider (Globe) in Philippines has problem receiving Short Messages (SMS) that are sent by my parents mobile phone provider (XL) in Indonesia. So, I cannot receive any smses at all from my parents until my parents decided to use a different mobile phone provider. I can't change a provider cause I am a postpaid customer that is bounded by a contract. My iPhone can only use the sim card from that one mobile phone provider.
I noticed this problem by end of last year. I have reported the problem to Globe and they have done any checking to their network between Philippines and Indonesia, and they told me that nothing is wrong. So, that means, the problem could be from XL, because I can receive SMS from other mobile phone providers in Indonesia such as from Telkomsel and IM3. But then, sending SMS to me in Philippines from Indonesia is quite expensive especially for my parents. For me, calling Indonesia from Philippines is expensive. So, the communication is limited only on urgent and important matters. I only call my parents once a month and they only text me when they have important news. They even seldom reply to my text if it's not urgent to reply. Honestly, I feel sad and disappointed.
But since I have a high speed internet connection at home, I try my best to find a way to fix the broken (tele)communication. This search brought me to this website: www.freesms4us.com. From this website, I can send and receive smses for free to any Indonesia mobile phone numbers, regardless the providers! And the best part is that whenever I send sms using this website, the number comes out to reply is an Indonesian phone number which I can read the reply on the same website.This is important cause that means my parents will send/reply sms to me for local rate. It's definitely cheaper for them and it's free for me. But the downside is, the sms isn't guaranteed to be delivered and received. I hope the website can improve on this because this website is really good to help people that have the same problem like me.
