No cure for a serial communicator

by Yeoh Siew Hoon

I knew I was a lost cause when, the other day, I was having drinks with friends at a bar in Montmartre, Paris, when I picked up my mobile to read an SMS, put it down and, in the same seamless motion, picked up my Blackberry to read an email.

I did this juggling act several times.

“Mon dieu, what are you doing?” my friend snapped.

I realised then I had become what I had long scorned – a chain texter and emailer. A serial communicator.

I had become worse than the chain smoker I had accused my Parisian friend of being. At least, his habit is considered social – well, at least, it is in France – whereas mine is totally anti-social.

In the old days, if you spoke to someone else in the middle of speaking to another person, it would be considered unacceptable behaviour. Rude. Obnoxious.

But today, we juggle several conversations at the same time.

I sit in a cafe in Paris and I am “talking” to friends all over the world. “Sitting in cafe, watching dog poo. No one picking up.”

“Bloody cold here. Need sun.”

“Having dinner in bistro. Gorgeous man next to me. Leather pants, leather jacket. Smoking Rothmans. Of course.”

I mean, I should be talking to the man and not to someone halfway round the world.

We go on walks with our devices because that’s when we feel we have time to speak to friends. On a walk in the woods of Brittany, I meet an elderly couple. Armed with walking poles, you can tell they are serious walkers.

Their initial smile turns to disapproval when they see me with my mobile and Blackberry laid out on the patch of grass next to me. I am taking a rest and instead of communing with nature, I am “communicating” with the world.

This is addiction of the highest order.

The first thing I did when I walked into the Singapore Airlines lounge at Charles de Gaulle was to ask if there was wireless. Yes, but it’s not free. The girl is almost embarrassed by the admission. These days, travellers expect wireless to be on tap. It’s become a human right, like the air we breathe.

As I write this in the lounge, my Blackberry, mobile and iPod are laid out next to my iBook at which I am furiously tapping away.

Suddenly, I hear giggles and laugher. I look up and see an entire Saudi Arabian family (the lounge is shared with All Nippon Airways and Saudi Arabian Airlines), clearly amused by me. The mother peeks out shyly from under her veil, smiles and points to her daughter who is giggling and mimicking my typing.

Mon dieu, what have I become? An obsessive, compulsive, virtual communicator, oblivious to the real, physical world around me.

At that instant, I vowed to myself, I must go cold turkey. Dump my devices and get a life.

Or I could get the Nokia 95 that, I am told, is “what computers have become”. It’s got everything in one, which means I wouldn’t have to juggle between devices (camera, iBook, mobile, Blackberry, iPod) and therefore I wouldn’t be so conspicuous.

I’d then become a stealth serial communicator.

Catch more of Yeoh Siew Hoon every week at The Transit Cafe