Did The Message Go Through?

In this present day and age we take communication over distances for granted. We look at the miscommunications that transpire and the messages that fail to send with annoyance, expecting them to always be successful %100 of the time. We forget that these technologies haven’t been around very long and that nothing is perfect. To us, the messages we try to send out and the ideas we try and get across are for  a moment the most important things in the world. What we fail to realize is that in the past, especially in times of war, these same miscommunications could be deadly.
Over 400 years ago Japan was in a state of almost constant war. The warlords of Japan were fighting each other for wealth and power in an attempt to take over all of Japan. thousands of people lost their live and among them some of the most important yet underappreciated people. Messengers were all over the country, delivering messages from warlord to warlord outside of battle and delivering messages from officer to officer in a battle. As you will find out in virtually any warring state type simulation game, messengers can be your best friend or your worst enemy. Often times you’ll find yourself trying to protect your messenger as the rush to carry out important messages to the warlords or other important figures. The death of that one messenger could spell disaster for your entire army. On the flip side you could be trying to kill the enemy messenger to stop them from delivering a potentially dangerous message to their warlords. These situations are a good reminder that during those times of war these messengers could be killed and those important messages could be lost to enemies or to bandits much in the same way that one’s text message may get blocked or fail to send. For some people it may not be to the same degree of importance but for others it could feel like losing a battle.
We treat these losses of communication as the greatest horror in our lives but is it really all that bad? Right now miscommunication could cost us a part of our reputation. In the past miscommunication could cost lives. Sometimes hundreds and sometimes thousands of lives could be lost due to one small error. In order to do something like call a friend could be misinterpreted to not call them and cause a lot of confusion. We have gotten to a point with technology where we take long distance communication for granted. When waiting for emails we often complain that it will take too long to arrive and when we receive mail through the post we react the same way. In more ancient times it took months to get mail across the ocean and this was assuming the boat didn’t sink along the way. Now we complain that it takes weeks to get mail which in comparison isn’t very long at all. Small countries like Japan were able to get mail across the country somewhat faster than in Canada but it may have been even more dangerous. Canada in the 16th century wasn’t exactly known for things like bandits and thieves lurking around its roads. However in Japan there were thousands of bandits, thieves and pirates all over the country. Rarely did these people discriminate against messengers and nobles when picking targets to attack and steal from. In this way avoiding getting attacked by animals and criminals made messages even more likely to be lost en route to their destinations in Japan than in Canada. So should we really be complaining about our “snail mail”? The only real concern we have is that it’ll be delivered to the wrong address.