left our jobs, went to Asia

A few words about telecommunications in Australia.

There still are plenty of payphones, and it does not seem like they are going out of fashion anytime soon. Most of them are even upgraded with a "send SMS" function. Bastards eat coins like crazy.

Mobile connection is very unreliable, except from cities. Understandable, bearing in mind the huge territory of the country. Expensive.

Internet. Poor Australians.

Timeworn computers in Grand central backpackers hostel, Perth, Australia

Costs around 3 to 5 dollars in internet cafes of the bigger cities. The facilities sometimes are imported from Ice Age. See above.

If you are unlucky to find yourself in a small town, in a middle of nowhere, the price jumps to 8-10 dollars per hour.

Have a laptop? Unlucky you! Be prepared to pay 25-30% more! No idea why. "By order of management".

The situation gets somewhat better if you have a place to live long-term. But just somewhat. Even in center of Sydney, some people have to live with stupid and unreliable "wireless DSL" or whatever the marketing name.

Sometimes the incumbent telecom Telstra manages to leave subscribers without internet connection for whole two days.

Their excuse - "You should have subscribed to Business package".