So, my uncle texted me and my mom this morning, asking if we can text internationally. And...I was asleep/not up yet wishing I was still asleep. I hadn't slept more than 2 hours on Monday night, so I was overdue for lots of shut-eye last night and this morning. Thank goodness I got it.
Alright, let's talk cell phones:
Like everything else, it's going to be more expensive using your phone in a different country. I go the ultra-cheap budget: don't use it at all unless I have WiFi. WiFi is $0, 0 €, etc, etc, etc.
You could go see what your cell phone company offers, but know that it isn't going to be pretty for everyone who is money conscious like me (and my dad...and my brothers...well, most of my family).
You can also go to a cell phone store in France/your destination country and buy a SIM card for your phone (a small card in your phone that basically IDs it and gives you a French phone number)...but I think that is a lot of hassle and even I get anxiety thinking of all the French vocab I'll have to remember.
Last time I was in France, I got away with just WiFi since I was at Colette's house and school most of the time. We'll see how this time goes, but I'm not worried. Cell data: Off; Airplane Mode: On.
The only things that I think would be nice to have from my phone is Google Maps and my email (that way if I have tickets in my email, I can just pull it up and not have to take pictures of them or try to save them in the Wallet on my phone...which I haven't quite figured out how to do with our train tickets...saving them to Note app it is...)
We'll be fine without our phones. No body freak out. Cell phones weren't a thing a couple decades ago. And if you're still worried about me, my parents "bought" an international data plan for my mom's phone in which they don't pay anything unless she uses it and the first 48 hours are free.
The French equivalent of 911 is 112. We're good. You think I haven't gone to France alone before?
Now, to answer my uncle's question directly: yes. We will be able to text internationally with him. We all have iPhones. Apple has iMessenger, which uses WiFi to send texts between iPhones (or even iPhone to iPad/iPod...any Apple device that has your normal Messenger app you text over) whenever they can. This means that if you have WiFi here at home and are texting a fellow iPhone user, you are sending it the text over WiFi anyway (you can tell because your text bubbles are blue instead of green).
Don't ask me if Android phones or other types of phones have the same type of deal. I don't know. I have an iPhone. My IT degree is PC Windows computers based. Everything I learn about phones comes from the internet and personal experience. Look it up yourselves.
Now, for my non-Apple friends and family, you can still easily text/message me. There's this thing called "Facebook Messenger": that chat that you have on Facebook? Yeah, that uses the internet. Totally free as long as you have a WiFi signal. And you can message me over an app called WhatsApp...but more on this one below.
Okay, texting out of the way, what if you want to call me while in France?
Skype? Yes, you can also use Skype over WiFi to message/face-time/call (though I've never just called someone with Skype before...it was always face-time).
That being said, I prefer to use WhatsApp over Skype. Why? Well, Skype was primarily designed for being used with computers, while WhatsApp was designed for smartphones.With WhatsApp, you can call, face-time, or text (and by text, I mean anyone...even your Android friends) and it syncs up with your phone contacts after you sign up for it. This means that you don't have to manually put anyone into your WhatsApp contacts. The app will automatically know who also has the app from their phone number, which is already in your normal phone contacts.
A little bonus: if you have separate ring tones for people, those work too. My brother called me (accidentally) while I was in France last time. I was incredibly surprised when I heard Bon Jovi singing to me instead of my regular ring tone. It's like "Holey CRAP?! That's Adam's ring tone!! No way! That works too?!"
And that little story segues into my next topic: time zones.
My brother was calling me to talk to me because I hadn't responded to his text message earlier in the day. And when I say "earlier" I mean EARLIER...for me. I guess somehow, he forgot that France is on the other side of the world. And the earth is round. And I am not going to text you back if you message me at 3 o'clock in the morning in the time zone I am in; so, save all your emergencies for when I get back, K?
It was so cute, though, to hear my niece on the phone with him, wondering why I was getting ready for bed when it was clearly early in the day for her. "Maybe she's taking a nap?" he asked. And I said, "Yeah...an 8 hour nap." Should've asked him if he wanted me to call him when I got up after said "nap", right? 😜
99.98% of the time, France is exactly 6 hours ahead of Eastern Standard Time, so for my local friends and family, it should not be all that difficult. 6 am in Indiana = 12 noon in France. 12 noon in Indiana is 6 pm (18:00) in France. Literally, find an analog clock and just look at the number opposite it. Don't call me after 4 pm (16:00)...I'm probably not going to answer, because it will be after 10 pm (22:00) where I am. Y'all know I'm not a night owl. Don't expect it to change just because I jumped over the pond for a few weeks.
I said 99.98% of the time, because I was glancing at the Paris clock once when I was here at home last year and realized that they were 7 hours ahead of us. I think it is just that we change our clocks at different times than they do. It eventually went back to 6 hours again. And I looked it up just now: they will change their clocks on October 31st this year. And we will change our time on November 7th. So, in between those days, it'll be a little weird. But it doesn't matter because I'll be home before then.
Okay, this may be the last post here in the states (unless I decide to do a short-ish post about packing later today).
Talk to you 6 hours in the future on Friday, mes amis!
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