Text Back

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It's 2011 already. These days, everyone must have probably gotten a cellphone. Not may be at the moment but even just once, in their existence. Long before the iPhone and Blackberry, and the rest of the smartphones, had existed, people depended on these handy gadgets for that one thing: instant communication. It's not like we're still in the old days when we would wait for months just to get a reply. And it's definitely not like in the magical world of Harry Potter where only owls were utilized to transmit information across borders. Luckily, we are in the 21st century and communicating with one another has never been faster and easier

Faster and easier. It sounds like it's just a breeze. It seems like communicating with these mobile phones is as easy as 1,2,3. No big trouble, after all. But now, tell me if it's just easy as what it seems, then why would people seem to have a hard time doing an equally easy thing just like replying to a text message?

Oh no, don't tell me that we'll start blaming these portable things for their difficult-to-understand interface, or their confusing buttons. That's just a lame answer one can ever get. Why don't we get a reply, then? 

Walang load.

I've known people who endlessly showcase and parade their expensive cellphones (and not just one) around, along with their numerous not-so cheap gadgets as if its the Pahiyas festival in Quezon, only that they do it daily and that they're showing off gadgets and not their harvested crops.  Really, the act is screaming 'I am techie-savvy and for Pete's sake I lurveee technology!!!" or whatever phrase is suitable for them in the urban dictionary. But surprisingly, sometimes, they confess,

Walang load.

Sometimes, as if it's a trick of fate or just some random coincidence, these would be the same people who brag that they do frequent, if not hang out, at Starbucks, as if its a ritual never to be missed. As if forgetting such trip to the notable coffee shop would be a mortal sin, and it would be unforgivable. So they go there, have coffee, and yes, do the cycle once again- the Pahiyas Techie Festival in Starbucks! I would have concluded that they're living a hell of a life! Places to go to. Money to spend. Extravagance and luxury to live.

Pero walang load.

I could only let out a deep sigh. Really.

We have cellphones, mainly, to communicate faster and easier, right? It's just funny -at least for me- that you go around parading how 'rich' you are with all those gadgets and with all the Starbucks getaways, and yet, you don't have enough credit in your phone for a P1.00 reply. Really, you're funny, who are you kidding?

For some, communication is a necessity; I don't know with the rest of the humanity, though. I thought it was a common sense to reply to someone who's asking something through text. Especially if it's an important query. Especially if it's urgent.  But surely, "Please reply" and "Text back" were coined to stress that it's just so overratedly vital to answer back. Or may be they are to remind us, as if a prodding that means, "Utang na loob, magpa-load ka at reply-an mo ako!!!"

By then, I found out, common sense is not so common after all.