| Kruger National Park asked if they could use this video on their site. Of course, we agreed, not asking for remuneration. |
Note: To all of our readers visiting our site via a smartphone, please click the “View web version” tab under the word “Home” at the bottom of the page to access the web version enabling you to access all of our archives on the right side of the page. We’ll be updating our site in a few months, making these extra steps unnecessary. Thank you.
 |
| Birdie’s hair was standing up on the day I gave Tom a haircut in Kauai. |
The total monthly cost for all of these services, as listed below, is a heck of a lot less than we paid for cable TV back in 2012 before we left to travel the world. I recall our WiFi and cable bill was INR 17708, US $234 a month.
As a result, now we don’t flinch at paying this $47.88 a month for these three services, including Amazon Prime and Express VPN, especially while we’re in lockdown. Once we are no longer in lockdown in a hotel, we’ll probably drop down to one of these services for those times at night after dinner when we like to watch a few shows.
However, if we’re in South Africa, we won’t need any streaming services. While there, we stayed outdoors on the veranda until bedtime each night, or we were out with friends or entertaining friends at our place. No streaming was necessary.
As members of Amazon Prime, which we use throughout the year to order various supplies, several good shows are included with the membership.
Streaming these services won’t work outside the US without a subscription to a VPN. In this case, the most popular VPN globally, Express VPN, has the best customer service on the planet at INR 7492, US $99 annually.
 |
| Tom’s hair was standing up before the haircut in Kauai, Hawaii, in May 2015. |
When adding the cost of Amazon Prime at INR 9762, US $129 a year, which also includes free shipping on most purchases and many great shows to stream, our annual total costs are as follows:
Amazon Prime: US $129.00
Express VPN: US 99.00
HBO: US 179.88
Acorn TV: US 59.88
Netflix: US 107.88
Total Annual Cost: US $574.64 INR 43485
Total Monthly Cost: US $ 47.89 INR 3624
With WiFi included in this hotel, other hotels, and holiday homes, in most cases, we rarely incur WiFi costs except for the data on our phones through Google Fi when we are out about.
This is a far cry from what we paid in the US. However, prices may have changed in the past several years since we’ve been gone.
 |
| Later in the day, I trimmed the stray hairs with scissors. Overall, an improvement. |
At this time, we are no longer able to use Graboid, a download streaming service we used for the first seven years of world travel. Once we both acquired Chromebooks in the past five months, Graboid is no longer an option when it doesn’t work on this operating system at this time.
Tomorrow in Part 2, we’ll post a list of some shows we’ve found entertaining and distracting during the lockdown in Mumbai, India, which for us began on March 20, 2020, when we were turned away at the airport for a booked flight to South Africa.
Stay safe. Seeking entertainment to make the time pass more quickly is helping us during our 48 days in lockdown stay.
Photo from one year ago today, May 6, 2019:
 |
| Ms. Toad, already fattening up for mating soon. We turn on the light each night to attract flying insects for her to eat. For more photos, please click here. |