handphone mania minus manners

there is now a handphone ban for all civil servants working under the home ministry. these civil servants, esp. those manning service counters are prohibited from using the handphone during office hours.

that is indeed a very good move, but seriously, at govt. service counters, i haven’t encountered any civil servants using handphone before, but if it is the other way round, the public going up the counter using handphone, that i saw before many times. it seems that many people have no courtesy at all when using handphone. right there at the counter when they are doing some transaction, and when their handphone rings, they will answer it there and then and the poor civil servant has to wait for her/him or to endure the customer’s yakkity yak. this is, provided, if the department do not ban handphone use. even if the dept. do not ban handphone, the public should know how to act, not to answer the phone when s/he is in the middle of doing something at the service counter.

i never do. even if i’m in the post office buying stamps, while waiting for the counter clerk to count the stamps or calculate the cost, if my handphone rings, iwill quickly shut if off. i never like to answer the phone in public places anyway. i don’t know, i feel so uncomfortable talking on the phone in a public place where everyone would be able to listen to you. and i wonder how people like to yak and yak and even laughed on the phone when in a public bus. i can never do that.

then we have this very irritating matter of people leaving their handphone on during meetings. i really wonder where has their handphone manners gone. don’t they know that this – switching the phone off or set to vibrate is one of the first basic handphone manners?

at many of the SSVP meetings, or other church meetings i attended, many of the members always leave their handphone on. maybe they forgot to turn it off. if so, ok, then when the phone ring, they should either quickly silence the phone or quickly excuse themselves out of the room to answer the phone. but can you believe it or not, some of them after the phone rings, will proceed to answer the phone right there and then! really! sometimes, the person bring his/her head down and answer it in a whispered voice, and sometimes the person move to a corner of the room to answer (not out of the room, mind you, but a corner of the room… still inside the room). i find it so very irritating. just for an hour of the meeting, can’t they choose not to answer the phone… unless they expect urgent calls, and even if an urgent calls comes in, it is only common courtesy to leave the room to answer the phone. in the very first place, of course, one should know that when one step in a room for a meeting, to set her/his phone to no ringing at all or to silent mode.

if i were to attend more of these meeting when these people are so rude and discourteous, i think one day i might burst and shout at them! but oh no i think i’m too timid to do that (and beside i’m only a small fry remember). well i suppose i will continue do what i’m doing now i.e. whenever i enter a room for meeting, i would purposely hold my own handphone high up and exclaimed loudly to myself “oh time for me to turn off my handphone since we are in a meeting now.” (hoping that this serve as a warning… er… reminder to the others to switch off their handphones too!!