how did those people manage?

Greetings from Balikpapan, Indonesia...I'll be here for 2 months, for training...

and it's really not what i expected...I thought it would be like Labuan, a small kampung but instead it's more like Miri, really kinda modern...well, if it has Starbucks then it must be modern. LOL but no McDonald's here...been just here for 2 days and the accommodation is great...the team here seems to be really nice too, just that I'm still not THAT geared up for work. perhaps the fact that I'll be missing CNY for 3rd consecutive year is bumming me out.

However, I managed to go back to Penang last week with my beau. I got in KL on Saturday evening and went to Penang on Sunday and stayed a day. Yahhhssss dah introduce my beau to the parents, grandparents and samkulokpor eemagujeh. LOL well not my fault that the entire extended family stays in the same house right? I think my parents liked him. he's just too quiet though. However he's getting more and more talkative lately...not sure if it was a good thing or not since one of the qualities i liked about him was of his shyness and quietness.

Anyways, met up with his parents too. Errr, not sure if I made a good impression or not, but it didn't matter lah, since we are still so new...but really happy that at least i got to pre-collect my angpows from my family hehehe. and my grandma gave me a jar of kuih kapit. i shall be hugging that kuih kapit while the whole family has steamboat during the reunion dinner. I miss my steamboat!!!

Oh, and these 2 days I was just catching up on emails etc and my online accounts...all really berterabur ha...I didn't know that I have so many online accounts for so many things...activated my I-Akaun for EPF, then I opened an online trading account for a bank, yet another account...then about a million loyalty cards for airlines...Emirates, Enrich MAS, Etihad Airways, then entah what else lah...then since I'll be away from Malaysia again (this time with beau, so must keep in touch with him else he will go astray) banyaklah semangat install this Skype lah, FreeCall lah dunno what. Oh, not to mention AirAsia account, MAS account, MAS Get the Deal account...Each account has different user name requirements...and some passwords needs alphanumeric, some alphanumeric symbol entah apa lah...I've already lost count of different types of usernames/passwords for certain accounts. Everytime also main hentam only. LOL

But i do realize that I am so reliant on these accounts!!!! Online banking to pay bills, make bookings or purchases...keep track of this and that and many many many many more. Don't think I could do without them...

Question is: before the advent of Internet, how did these people manage these different utilities? I find even via using Internet it's very time consuming already...imagine in those zaman dinosaur, we had to queue up slowly to make bank transactions, pay utilities bills, EPF, stock trading, buy air ticket etc. Can die lorrrrrrr...

Oh well. that's all my coretan. :)