Life without Wi-Fi

Access to the internet has become one of life’s basic necessities for people all over the world. Wherever we go, the first thing we do is to ask for the Wi-Fi password because we find it impossible to live without the internet. It is now so widespread, that the majority of shops, restaurants hotels and shopping centres offer free Wi-Fi in order to attract more and more customers.

What is Wi-Fi? It’s a popular wireless facility that offers high-speed access to the internet via radio waves.

In many developed countries, free Wi-Fi in public places such as parks, squares and bus stops has become commonplace. Municipal wireless networks are capable of offering high speeds for third and fourth generation networks (3G and 4G), which are often free, and can be used even by devices that don’t have a sim card, such as laptops and tablets! This is why many municipalities have tried to respond to people’s needs by offering free Wi-Fi hubs in central parts of town. Recently even public transport has become equipped with Wi-Fi.  

Access to the internet has become a basic requirement of life and we are all dependent on it one way or another.

Wi-Fi is particularly appealing to the young, who use it not only to communicate, but also for entertainment. Of course older people have learnt to use it too, but it is the younger generation that spends more hours of the day connected to Wi-Fi. Use can sometimes border on the addictive, as happens with drugs, and this can ring alarm bells in the family.

That is why we need to know how to use the internet correctly, especially during adolescence. When you don’t have access to Wi-Fi you feel like a caveman living thousands of years ago. In fact some people believe that life without Wi-Fi is a life with no entertainment. But that’s not true: we can enjoy the warmth of our family by talking to each other, watching a film, even doing housework together.  For example, a friend of mine told me that if she ends up with no Wi-Fi some day, she will take up sports. She loves long distance running and it makes her happy.

She visits friends because personal contact is more meaningful and much more interesting than Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp. She also goes to theatres, museums, concerts and other cultural events. Of course without Wi-Fi you don’t have access to news and information from the rest of the world.

Even though today it is impossible for us to imagine a life without electricity, internet or mobile telephone, it is quite possible that continued exposure to the radiation these devices produce may have negative effects on our health. However, even if we turn off our Wi-Fi, there are a myriad other signals and sources of radiation that we cannot escape from. These could also have a detrimental effect on the human body and might cause headaches, tiredness, sleep disorders, digestive problems, brain and memory disorders, anxiety, even depression.