This is Hidden Brain, I'm Shankar Vedanta.

Many years ago, when Gloria Mark was visiting family in Austria,

she found it difficult to get a reliable internet connection.

My mother-in-law, who lived in a very small Austrian town, she didn't have

Wi-Fi and I couldn't stay away from internet that long.

And so what I did one day was walk around the neighborhood

with my laptop open, looking at the bars on my computer

to see when I might find a hot spot and sure enough I did

find one and I sat down on the edge of the front lawn of a house and I was doing my email.

In a little while Gloria looked up to see she had company.

Two elderly gentlemen came out of the house, they brought lawn chairs and they sat down

right in front of me and they didn't say a word and I didn't say anything to them and I just wanted to get through my email.

That was my goal and I was certain they were going to ask me to

leave and they did not look very friendly so I didn't think it was going to be a friendly

ask and they just kept watching me.

Gloria tried to think of a way to explain herself across the language barrier.

After a while I pointed to myself and I said California.

And all of a sudden they started laughing and they said Schwarzenegger because at the time

their Austrian son actor turned governor Arnold Schwarzenegger was the governor of California and then I knew I had their approval and I could continue sitting there and I was able to finish my email.

Those were innocent times.

In a few years Gloria was to discuss Those were innocent times.

In a few years, Gloria was to discover the opposite problem.

...