I am old enough to remember a time when the Internet was something out of science fiction, when mobile phones came in briefcases and when the word Googled did not exist in anyone’s dictionary. How different it is today.
I have weaned myself off my attachment to my mobile phone. Folks I sometimes even leave home without it! Yep. And like those who have given up smoking I find myself increasingly intolerant of phone addicts. I stare down with indignation at those who dial up during dinner conversation — grounds for divorce in my book — or those whose fingers are constantly texting like a recurrent itch. Now I hear, horror of horrors, that our last sanctuary is about to go: Phones are about to be allowed on planes. Emirates, Quantas and Ryan-Air have all announced plans to allow mobile phone use on aeroplanes.
What’s wrong with that? I hear you say. A lot in my view. It’s exactly like smoking — admittedly without the same dangers to your health — fine if you do it in an open air space, fine in the privacy of your own home, but a real nuisance in an enclosed space. Am I the only person who gets insanely irritated at being forced to eavesdrop on people’s inane conversations? And most of the time, they are so unnecessary. It’s one thing to phone home to say you’ll be late, it’s another to phone home surrounded by strangers and give your spouse a blow-by-blow account of the aggravations of your day. Just the other day I was sitting at a seafood bar at Heathrow airport, quietly enjoying my smoked salmon. Then came a big American man to occupy the seat on my right, and a tall skinny Irishman took the seat on my left.
The American was first on the dial. I was treated to a gushy conversation with his five-year-old daughter followed by a terser conversation with his wife where he outlined his plans to fool the taxman by valuing his house at less than the market value. Not very intelligent or terribly honest I thought. Then the man on my left picked up his weapon of mass annoyance and dialed home too. Much more intimate this one. I was left in no doubt as to what he would be doing with his wife once he got home that evening. Oh please! I asked for the bill and escaped.
What is it about phones that push us to say things in front of strangers that we would never say in face-to-face conversation? There must be something uninhibiting in speaking directly into someone’s ear, something that perhaps makes us forget the presence of others. But they are there folks, we are there, listening despite ourselves and being irritated at hearing just one half of a conversation. It is like seeing a film where you can only hear half the characters, your brain scrambling to decipher what the other characters must be saying. Can you imagine how frustrating that would be?
And when it comes to phone use, we Arabs are among the worst offenders. In my experience only the Italians can give us a run for our money. How familiar is this experience: You sit in a café with family and friends and not a single sentence is completed without one of you having to answer a phone call. Or this one: A couple sits in a café and one of them is on the phone the whole time they are there. Or another: The family is gathered at dinner and a phone is being passed from person to person so that we can all give our best wishes to Auntie B who is recovering from an operation.
I don’t have an issue with people answering phone calls because they may be urgent or important. It is those who make calls or who chat on endlessly when they are spending time in someone else’s company who make me very angry. It is so disrespectful, and really quite offensive, yet few even notice how rude it is.
On a more global level, it worries me that we are losing the art of conversation. A good conversation is like a game of tennis, it requires focus and attention, an exchange of ideas that gets batted back and forwards. Communication and respect is the key to any successful relationship. The first is a skill whilst the second is a value, both are in increasingly short supply in the modern world.
Ah we can now travel the world knowing that we can be contacted 24/7 and that a Starbucks is never far. It reminds me of the Accidental Tourist, where the lead character travels without experiencing change in his day-to-day needs. It is the triumph of the lowest common denominator. Starbucks for instance make rather lousy coffee, it certainly does not compare with most coffee served in Parisian cafes, yet on my last visit to Paris I was scandalized to find not only that Starbucks outlets had mushroomed but that there were queues at most of them when just next door cafes had plenty of seats available. Why? Why would anyone choose to go to Starbucks when they could have the original experience of watching the world go by in a Parisian café? Have we become averse to experiencing different cultures? Is that it? Have we become dependent on the blandness of the familiar?
As much as I can gripe about mobile phones, Starbucks and the other nuisances of the modern world, I would not wish to go back to the world before them. For one thing that would be a world without Google, and who could live without it? Not me. I still can’t get over the thrill of having all that information at my fingertips. It’s pure magic. The latest news is that even doctors are now being encouraged to use Google in their diagnosis. That I must admit worries me a little, surely doctors should have access to their own magical search engine where they can type in symptoms and whoosh a diagnosis appears on screen in seconds. Can it be that it does not exist? But then maybe that is part of the genius of Google, it makes the same information available to everyone. True democracy in a sense. Though we still need the expertise of the medical profession, the access to information that Google and other search engines provides enables us to be more proactive in managing our health care. No longer do we simply nod and agree to whatever the doctor recommends, we can now look up different drugs and treatments and make our preferences known. I know it annoys the medical profession but it is time they showed a little more respect for the intelligence of their patients.
How did we ever live without Google? In fact I may just give in and get a blackberry just so that I can access it any time, anywhere, any place — even on a plane! Guess I’m just as bad as those phone addicts after all.
