Hello? Phone manners anyone?

Every now and then, I meet a good friend of mine for lunch. Actually, let me rephrase that: every now and then, I ask if I can join him and his Blackberry for lunch.

He then pretends to be offended and acts as though the only blackberries he knows of are the fruity kind.

Every so often, during said lunch, the gadget will buzz, and my friend’s eyebrows will comically shoot up to apologetic arrows, followed by a “Sorry, I have to take this”.

In all fairness, it’s usually someone like the Prime Minister, so what can I say?

Mobile phone intrusion is fine when it’s between friends. In a way it’s like when you have a smoker friend. You know that you’ve got to, even in the middle of winter, bag the outside table if you want the conversation to keep flowing and stop the friend from getting the shakes.

However, it is not all fine when horrible, in-your-face breach of phone manners happens constantly with strangers who don’t respect your noise boundary.

This is a conversation I was forced to listen to at the cinema the other day, 15 minutes into the film, when I was still grappling with the plot:

“Hi! I’m at the cinema. No, I’m fine to talk. So did you hear about Rachel? Really? Really? No! You’re joking! Not Mark?! Yes. With Vicky? Two weeks ago. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know … yeah, yeah”.

You see, there are still idiots who can’t grasp the fact that everyone else in the cinema might not be interested in last night’s musical chairs.

But it could be worse. Here’s what happened to my cousin last week: she had to go to Mater Dei for some blood tests. At the unit’s reception she was left waiting for a long time – the nurses were busy texting and having a laugh over whatever it was they were texting.

My cousin cleared her throat politely, for nothing. It was only when she gave a whooping cough like a bark that the nurses – reluctantly – let go of their phones and grudgingly started to process her papers.

After another long wait she was called in. Half way through the blood extraction – and let it be said that my cousin is not very good with needles – the nurse’s mobile phone rang. Obviously she an-swered it. And of course, she had a delightful chat with the person on the other end about the weekend’s planned shopping outing.

The moral of these stories? It’s high time we really restrained ourselves and started practising some kind of phone etiquette. I understand the need to keep the mobile phone on you in case, I don’t know, your kids are suddenly taken ill, or you get an urge to listen to your lover’s voice (although let me just point out that up to a decade ago we all did very fine without one).

But please, when we’re in public and the phone call is not do-or-die, can’t we just say: “Call you later”?

Also, unless you work at the customer service desk of a mobile service provider, do not text while on a job with people in front of you. It’s downright rude. Really, I am surprised that ­people – in a nation which specialises in Maltese gemgem – don’t complain at all about ­this.

It’s as if we truly believe that having a smart phone stuck to our palm gives us the right to ignore anyone standing in front of us.

Admittedly I am a phone-phobic control freak. All my friends glance lovingly at their ringing, buzzing phones every 30 seconds, whereas I want to hear from my friends only at my own convenience – certainly not when, say, I am reading a book or dining out. It’s irritating, but it would appear that I am in a minority.

I should say here that I held out for years before getting a mobile phone. By the time I got one, in 2004, everyone, including my grandmother, had one. The idea of being permanently available to everybody filled me with horror, and it still does, which is why I don’t necessarily answer mine, especially if I can’t see who the caller is.

I know that mobile phones are here to stay, and in psycho-babble, people have learnt to ‘embrace’ them, but can I suggest that we all read Umberto Eco’s hilarious essay on ‘How not to use the cellular phone’?

Eco thinks that indiscreet, ostentatious users are deserving of social banishment. Hear, hear.

Am I the only one who finds that manners are simply flying all over the place with these communication gadgets?

“Yes you are,” texted my lunch friend. Here’s hoping he was not having tea with the Prime Minister when he texted that.

Krischetcuti@gmail.com