💌 Goodbye Skype ~ the last frozen screen
A semi-love letter to my first video call application, plus: the Great Lakes, Match Cup, and Toledo hot dogs
“Where are we meeting – Skype or WhatsApp?”
I typed this fateful WhatsApp message to my friend Jessica the other day.
She responded, “Skype isn't available anymore, so let’s try Zoom or Teams.”
This is a good friend I hadn't spoken to in months, so we quickly shared a link to Zoom and had our conversation.
For an instant, my heart popped inside.
What did she mean that Skype wasn’t available?
The next day, I did some investigating and Jessica was right: On May 5, 2025, Skype hung up the phone for good.
I was shattered. A piece of me felt it had been completely erased. This is true, partially due to the large digital footprint I had been creating on Skype since 2011.
If you’re like me, Skype was the first application I used to call home from a different country.
I made friendships, tried to keep long-distance relationships, and even had my first-ever conversation with my future wife, Yesi, on Skype.
I laughed, cried, yelled, and talked for hours on Skype.
If I had a nickel for each hour I’ve spent on Skype in my lifetime, I’d have maybe $75. That’s a lot of cash!
Skype for me was like the symbol of my evolution from a young and dumb 20-year-old to a less dumb 30-year-old.
It was devastating knowing that Skype, a product of Microsoft, was now somewhere flying in innovation heaven.
Damn.
My sadness slightly outweighed my understanding. In reality, since the pandemic, most people I knew (me included) migrated to Zoom.
Skype often had frozen screens, ghost calls, time lapses, and for some reason, hackers kept trying to get into my account.
I wish I could have logged in, gotten frustrated, and logged off one last time to say goodbye.
In the end, it feels like discovering two months too late that it didn’t exist anymore was how Skype would have wanted to go out.
Skype, if you’re reading this, wherever you are, thank you for everything.
Thanks for one heck of a ride.
P.S. I still had a $3.50 phone balance, but you can keep it.
Travel Quote of the Week 🤲
The pleasure we derive from journeys is perhaps dependent more on the mindset with which we travel than on the destination we travel to.
– Alain de Botton
Africa’s biggest lake 🐟
When I think of the Great Lakes, my mind immediately thinks of North America. There’s also a Great Lakes region in Central and Eastern Africa. The largest lake by far is Lake Victoria.
According to Wikipedia, it’s 223 miles long and 209 miles wide, making it the largest lake in the entire African continent.
It’s the world’s second-largest freshwater lake behind Lake Superior. Lake Victoria crosses three international borders between Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania.
The best four days in Bermuda 🇧🇲
If you find yourself in Bermuda this week, you’re in luck!
Cup Match is happening this week, and it’s one of the biggest annual cultural events in Bermuda. Held during the last week of July, Cup Match is massive. It celebrates the country’s abolition of slavery and love for the island’s favorite sport: cricket.
Slavery on the island was abolished on August 1, 1834. Cricket grew in popularity among native Bermudians a few years later, thanks to its introduction by British sailors in the 1840s. The first Cup Match was played in 1901 among men from Somerset and St. George to celebrate Emancipation Day.
Fast forward to 2025, Cup Match is larger than ever.
For four days, the whole island is in festive mode. It’s commonplace for people to set up camp either on the beach or around the cricket match. People attend parties at different camps or watch the annual Cup Match Cricket Classic between Bermuda’s two heavyweight clubs, St. George’s Cricket Club and Somerset Cricket Club.
The festivities include Emancipation Day and Mary Prince Day. Mary Prince was a freed Bermudian slave who wrote an autobiography about life as a servant. Her story was a driving force behind the emancipation movement in Bermuda. She was one of the island’s first abolitionist activists and nowadays is a national hero.
It's common to hear soca music and eat fresh seafood during the celebrations. The drink of choice during Match Cup is a Rum Swizzle. A cold cup of swizzle contains rum, fruit juice, bitters, garnish, some kind of sweetener, and a swizzle stick.
A presidential dog in Toledo🌭
If you’re looking for something random to do in Toledo, Ohio, head to the original Tony Packo’s Cafe. Here you’ll find a wall of celebrity autographs on fake hot dog buns. However, there is one autograph on a real hot dog bun and surprisingly still intact – that of 39th President Jimmy Carter.
Thanks for reading! I really appreciate your time and hope you enjoyed this week’s post. Another brand spankin’ new Itchy Feet is coming soon.
Much love,
-Daniel
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Toledo...Tony Packo's is definitely worth the trip if you're in the area. I'd also recommend the Toledo Museum of Art, especially the Glass Studio.
I was surprised Skype bit the dust, too, Daniel. I remember first time I heard someone talk about Zoom and it was, what? Guess the world was just ready for a different player. But Teams is also MSFT. I used it the other day, someone had set up a meeting, and it worked like Zoom, though I didn't have to set up an acct, I was added as a guest. Brave New World!