I want to be able to correspond with my son and his sitter while in Italy. I know I can e-mail them from a "Cyber-Cafe". My question is: can they then turn around and e-mail me back at whatever one I happen to be in?? If not, any suggestions for me? Thanks for you help

Sally, your email is on your ISP's server not at whatever Internet cafe you may frequent. When you log into your email you are virtually logging onto the closed system of your ISP, the point of access is a non issue. <BR> <BR>Whether or not they can write you back is more dependent on if they are at their computer or not. If they are then you should be able to exchange email between one another. <BR> <BR>Cheers

1. Get a hotmail id and you can communicate and not worry about your other id <BR>2. lot's of cyber-cafe's in major cities. maybe your hotel has a business center with internet connectivity. <BR>cost is about $6 / hr so it is not cheap

Fred and George: Thanks so much for your helpful replies!!

To expand on George's suggestion, you can get free email from numerous sources -- hotmail.com is one, others are excite.com and iwon.com. We've used them for a couple of years and they work very well.

Sally -- <BR>You should know that European keyboards are somewhat different than American ones, and this may pose a problem logging on (if you can't find numbers or symbols). When we were in Paris I was using a cybercafe to check the family e-mail and was wondering aloud "if anybody in here types in English" when the young British guy next to me said "How can I help you?" Anyway, somewhere I've seen an explanation of the differences - maybe another Fodorite can help?