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China
Charlie
 A weekly column about living
in Dongguan, for those new to Dongguan, new to China, or anyone
that likes a good story. Written by an expat who
first came to Dongguan in 1987, hopefully this series of
articles will be both entertaining and informative.
Archives:
Welcome to China
Charlie
Dongguan
Driving Challenges
Fun With Air Travel in
China
Vertical Speed Bumps
Language and Culture
Mobile Phones and Other Stuff
Karen Carpenter, Kenny G and the Chinese Water Torture… . .
Dan Gerous, where are you when we
need you?
Life in hotels in the “old days”, a “Moon Shot”,
and the saga of the pink panties….
Was There Life
After M*A*S*H
Camaraderie of Dong Guan in the “old days”.. . .
Who's on First, China Style
Life at the
Ramada/Guangzhou, Resting trucks, Dynamite, and other stuff
Is
Dongguan becoming too civilized?
Roadside Word
Games, China Style |
Mobile phones and
other stuff… . . .
Mobile phones are pretty much a
necessity of life in most parts of the world, and
particularly here in China. These days they’re
usually a compact unit that’s more “intelligent”
than its user, marketed by the likes of Nokia,
Samsung, Panasonic, Motorola, etc. You can program
your phone to do everything from silently vibrate,
to play the theme from “Ghostbusters”, or croak like
a Frog, to announce an incoming call.
In some parts of the
world, mobile phones are not allowed in certain
places (Courts, Theaters, Churches, etc), but here
in China there don’t seem to be any regulations (or
if there are, most people ignore them).
While it may be hard to believe, about
15 years ago, one of the major hotels in Guangzhou
had “no phone” areas in their restaurants (and this
was before there were non-smoking areas). This
particular hotel tried to enforce the phone ban in
certain areas of their restaurants by placing an
engraved Brass sign on each table in the zone. After
about 6 months, they abandoned the concept, not so
much because people objected to the ban, as because
the Brass signs kept disappearing (I have a friend
from Hong Kong that has two of them).
During “no phone zone” period, having a
mobile phone was a real status symbol, and a friend
of mine and I decided to see how many patrons of
this hotel we could shock. At the time the average
mobile phone being used in China was a Motorola unit
that was about 10 inches tall, by 2 inches square,
and a toy that looked and had a ring tone exactly
like it, was being made in South China. I had found
a place that you could buy these toys Motorola’s for
10 RMB, so we bought a couple.
On an early Saturday Evening, when the
restaurants were the busiest, my friend took our
“Motorola” with him when we met for dinner. After
placing the order, we pushed the button that made
the phone ring , my friend grabbed the (toy) phone,
jumped up, and hollered “Hello” as we had seen most
people do. He then hollered “Hello” a couple more
times (again as we had seen most people do), held
the phone at arms length, called the phone a rather
unkind name, and threw it against the wall. No one
moved or said a thing, they just stared in
disbelief. We were really never barred from the
restaurant, but the staff seemed to be a little more
alert when ever we walked in.alked in.
The fact that having a mobile phone was
a status symbol lead to several funny situations.
Guys setting across a table from each other talking
to each other, people “talking” on the mobile and
having it ring, were fairly common.y common.
Actually as was in the beginning of
this, having a mobile phone is almost a necessity
these days, but you do need to remember what they
represent. Recently, I had the misfortune to be
exposed to a person that apparently wanted my
mobile. Somehow this person managed to get it out of
the case that I carried it in, on my belt, without
my realizing it. The phone was several years old and
I was going to replace it soon, so other than
pictures of my family on it (the phone had a camera
in it), I didn’t consider it any great loss. After I
got another phone, I realized that I hadn’t backed
up the phone numbers (or any other information) in
the memory on the phone. If you have a mobile phone,
learn from my experience, and back up any
information in the memory on a regular basis. Most
phones today have a computer connection, so it
should be fairly easy, and believe me, it’s a worth
while exercise.exercise.
That’s about it for “Charlie” this week
so “Ya’ll have a rice week” |
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