by Bayo Olupohunda (bayoolupohunda@yahoo.com)
By Bayo
Olupohunda (bayoolupohunda@yahoo.com)
Her
obsessive romance with her phone, which repeatedly came in the way of our
acquaintance, can be likened to having a conversation with the deaf. So, I had
proceeded to ignore this new question; one of the many she had asked, while she
took intermittent pauses,
with the usual vacant look, from her dialogue with
her imaginary phone character, intent on ruining my evening. I was going to
treat her new enquiry like a rhetorical question; but leaning close to me, she
asked the question again, insisting on an answer. Her persistent question about
my BlackBerry status threw me off balance for a moment.
But
when I recovered, my response was quick and brusque, “I don’t use a BlackBerry”
Her reaction was immediate. The shock in her eyes was unmistakable. Her
unspoken expression was; how would you not have a BlackBerry in this age and
time? Then, she seemed to switch off completely. Her expression became
distant. From that moment, each time we manage to find to something to
talk about, she would look past me, as if addressing a phantom.
I
was amused by it all.
I
had met the restless 20-something university belle some hours earlier in the
company of my young cousin. And because it was a Friday night, we all ended up
in one of those nightclubs on Victoria Island where you will have to spend some
nervous moments scrutinising the menu.
I
was immediately struck by my female guest almost compulsive attraction to her
BlackBerry phone. All through our conversation that night, she stayed glued to
it. Her fingers tapped furiously at the tiny buttons on the keypad. She was a
sight to behold. Her addiction, her obsession, became a spectacle. As she
tapped frantically on the tiny keypads, she would pause occasionally, a frown
appearing on her brow. At another time, she would laugh out hysterically,
rocking back and forth on the chair with a loud yell. People turned to look.
She hardly noticed, or did not care. When the waiter appeared to take our
order, she was not listening. She was completely oblivious of the happenings
around her. As soon as she realised I was not a BlackBerry phone user,
our conversation seemed to freeze out. I became another statistic, another face
in the crowd.
But
I had it coming.
Long
after the BlackBerry phone made its classy foray into the telephone
consciousness of the upwardly mobile, I had been indifferent to its ability to
quickly transform one’s status symbol; or doesn’t it? I have never taken myself
seriously. For example, many years after Nokia 3310 became embarrassingly
outdated, I had carried mine with pomp.
Recently,
I walked into one of the mobile telephone shops, just as I had done in the last
few years, and each time, I had come out with my wallet intact. I have never
been able to justify the reason why I should spend so much money on any
hand-held device. Despite the craze that followed the introduction of the
BlackBerry and the iPhones, androids and iPads of this world, I have always
considered them as passing fads for those who find them as status symbols.
For
example, a majority of young Nigerians who carry these phones around hardly
maximise the use of the features that come with them. But I guess it is
fashionable to be seen with the most expensive phone in town. What, for
example, are the unique features of a BB, aside from instant messaging, that
make them a-must-have other than the status symbol that goes with logging it
around?
Okay,
maybe it is useful for folks who have loads of emails to answer per second.
Otherwise, what is the point of a young person barely 17, paying monthly
surcharges just for chatting, tweeting and Facebooking? Or does
it have to do with the good feeling of owning a BB? Ok, you may say it’s cool
to tweet, Facebook and ping at the same time. But what
makes them desirable apart from these features? Are there no other phones
performing the same functions?
My
grouse with these new mobile phones is the frequency at which new models of the
same phone are released into the mobile telephone market by the manufacturers.
As soon as you buy a new phone, at the blink of an eye, another newer model
with supposedly superior features is released into the market. In less than a
month, your new phone suddenly becomes the older version of the new one. And
the cycle continues. What phone fashionistas fail to realise is that although
the new model may appear sleekier than the ones they have, in reality, the
manufacturers have only added a feature or two to make them the new model of
the old one.
One
feature of a BlackBerry phone which makes it attractive to users, especially
young people, is the instant message feature, popularly known as “pinging”. Now
that comes with its own hazard. Recently, careless and indiscriminate pinging
has become fatal. Inside a Lagos bus, I sat with a guy who ensured that his
BlackBerry was conspicuously angled in a position where everybody could see it.
He was barely 16. My young cousin told me that in students’ parties on campus
(even secondary schools), you will be “gated” without possessing the most
expensive type of BlackBerry!
Now
the BlackBerry craze has claimed its first casualty.
In Ajah, Lagos, a girl chatting
passionately while crossing the road was knocked down recently. In Ogun State,
it was reported by The PUNCH recently that a youth corps member, one
Egbe Ogbu, lost his life while pinging in the middle of the road — I
mean the guy simply committed suicide. In the report, a learner driver was said
to have knocked down the guy as he crossed the road while pinging. He was
chatting on his BB that he did not realise the danger to his life. The
statement by the driver was shocking and revealing of the danger this BB crazy
posed to users. She
said: “Mr. Ogbu was busy pinging on the road; I did not know when he got in
front of my car.’’
Now,
who do we blame? The corps member or the driver?
Have
you also noticed how BB users treat their phones as companion? How many times
have you been with a BB user and you have felt like punching them in the face?
I mean, you are in this conversation with a friend and they are pinging away,
ignoring you in the process. What could be more annoying? So, you can imagine
how I felt when I became the latest casualty the other day. I was simply
“dumped” for not being able to provide my BB pin. Now, I am thinking of getting
a BlackBerry, if only to keep up with the Joneses.
PUNCH
Life was sweeter when apple Ǻn̶̲̥̅̊ԃ black berry where just fruits
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