Must that sensitive call be public?

Sep 07, 2012

It might be the confusion which comes with calling them public places, or it might just be a girl thing, that (some) women just don’t give one rap who is listening in as they make or take their calls in public. Oh, and the discussions they hold with other women they are with in those places.

Men's say with Bob G. Kisiki
 
It might be the confusion which comes with calling them public places, or it might just be a girl thing, that (some) women just don’t give one rap who is listening in as they make or take their calls in public. Oh, and the discussions they hold with other women they are with in those places.
 
I was in a taxi from the Makerere University main gate, heading to town one evening, when one of the students, who had boarded after me, scooped her sleek phone from her bag and dialled a number. Soon, her contact picked, and the filth started to spew out... 
 
I don’t disrespect myself enough to repeat what we all heard her say, but the long and short of it is, she was telling the other party, also a woman (from the name she called her), that so-and-so, who was intimately known to both of them, was playing about with her new catch and, should she not take this Campus caller’s advice, another woman would grab him from her.
 
She concluded by asking the person she was calling to advise this ‘fool’ who was mishandling a good guy to go to a witchdoctor to ‘immunise’ the lover against dumping her, and to cause him to love her more. No, I might be a fiction author, but I do that in novels, not on this page.
 
There are many times I have been in taxis and, though many people make and take calls, the women’s calls just take the entire cookie box. Someone calling another to say her waters have burst and she is on the way to see her doctor; another calling her maid to give instructions of the most intimate nature on what she should do before ‘Daddy’ returns home, including giving reasons why she would not be home early.
 
Oh yes, I heard this one, saying she was to see aunt Kevina, and by the time they would be through with their lugambo (loose talk), it would be late. This, accompanied with raucous laughter as she acknowledged how embarrassing what she had said could have been.
 
Away from taxis, I once attended the famed Corporate League, where all those youngsters who drive you off the road in their 4x4 pickup trucks with MTN, utl, URA, Uganda Breweries, X-fm and other corporate company logos, congregate to pretend to play various games, but in reality, to show up and show off. 
 
Well, there was this particular girl who went to the grounds yes, but not to play. Soon as she settled down, as the games got underway, she got out her phone and made a call.
 
The recipient was a man, and she was pleading that he takes her back. There, in the tent, with all manner of people forming the audience. From the one-sided version of the chat that we heard, the guy was not budging. So she dropped the pleading and wept, then cajoled, threatened and pleaded some more... She hung up, then called again.
 
Doubt it if you choose to, but this series of calls lasted not less than two solid hours, and she didn’t care that by the time she stomped into her car, still weeping, we knew practically everything to do with her ill-fated relationship.
 
Of course some things can’t wait, I admit. But if you must make a sensitive call, must you go out of your house before making that call? Or if the urge finds you in a public place, must you divulge every detail? See, sometimes how the public treats you is a direct result of how you present yourself. You show them a joker, they receive you as one. You present yourself as cheap; they have no time to transform you into something else. 
 
I am a seasoned public transport user, but besides men who shout at the top of their lungs as they use the phone, I never hear any of them discuss uncomfortable things in public places. No way. Plus, I wonder why it is that, when you listen to such conversations, it is you the civilised party who cringes with shame and unfair embarrassment. Why is it so?

(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});