Mobile phones and the fax of life
Three New Russians are sitting in a banya (sauna) when a mobile telephone rings. One of them takes out a tiny sleek telephone from his towel and starts talking.
After finishing his call, he boasts: "This is the latest in telephone technology, the Nokia X7832."
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Another phone rings. The second New Russian replies with no handset in sight.
"I have had an earpiece implanted in my earlobe and a speaker in a tooth," he explains afterwards.
The third New Russian starts shaking uncontrollably, emitting whirring noises.
"What's wrong with you?" the others ask.
"I'm receiving a fax."
It has become a cliché to state that our world is becoming increasingly homogenised. Globalisation and modern technology, it is said, are fast effacing our national boundaries and identities. But what fascinates me is the reverse phenomenon: how the use of global technologies so rapidly assumes national characteristics, as the above anecdote (first heard by your correspondent in the mid-1990s in Moscow when mobile phones were becoming the fashion accessories of flashy biznismeni) obliquely shows.
When I had the joyous job of reporting on Asia for the FT, I used to while away many a waiting hour at airports trying to guess the nationalities of my fellow passengers. I found one of the surest ways to identify nationalities was by watching how they used their mobile phones.
The Chinese would simply shout into their phones oblivious to all around them. They would often have two, sometimes three, phones dangling from their belts. The Japanese, by contrast, were models of politeness whispering into their telephones and often cupping their free hands over the mouthpiece so as not to disturb their fellow passengers. It reminded me of their consideration in wearing facemasks when travelling on public transport so as to avoid spreading colds. South Koreans hung their Samsung phones from cords around their necks. Filipinos tended to text rather than talk.
Over the past year, I've been watching phone users in Europe and have reached the following (wholly unscientific) conclusions. Any male who runs his fingers through his hair while talking on the phone is likely to be French. Russian men - like the Chinese - shout into the telephone as if scaring off a bear, even when, or perhaps especially when, talking to their wives or mistresses. Italians can be instantly spotted by their expansive hand gestures. I was convinced that one Italian passenger I saw in a queue at Milan airport must be a conductor practising for one of the more tempestuous passages of a Verdi opera at La Scala until I realised that he was just talking on a hands-free phone. The British divide into two telephonic types: either they bray down the phone in high-decibel self-importance or they retreat from the crowd into self-conscious isolation.
You will perhaps not be surprised to learn that academics are already studying the subject. Gratifyingly, their analytical research seems to bear out some of my casual observation.
Comparing the use of mobile phones in public places in London, Madrid, and Paris, Dr Amparo Lasen, a sociology lecturer at Complutense University of Madrid, has found that mobile phones give "new meanings to dead times and transitional spaces" in different countries' cultures.
So, for example, Madrile?os, who "live" in the street, often talk as freely in public as they do at home and almost always accept calls no matter where they are. Parisians view public places as stages on which they perform with mobile phones serving as just another prop. Lasen observed that French women sitting alone in Parisian cafes were almost always speaking on their phones, or had left them ostentatiously on the table beside them. Londoners, however, tend to view streets as transient, functional places. They do not dawdle long, but talk as they move. They are far more inclined to screen calls and use voicemail.
However, after conducting two comparative field studies in 2002 and 2004, Lasen concluded that mobile phone habits in the three cities were becoming increasingly similar. Maybe globalisation does eventually trump national characteristics after all. She certainly observed that people were becoming far more tolerant of mobile phone use in public places. "There is a reaction against novelty and people mistrust it. But when people start using phones themselves they become more tolerant and perceptions change," she says. "In the US mobile phones came later than in Europe and there is still more resistance. They consider them unsuitable - and have tried to ban them - in schools and some other public places."
My own amateur anthropological observations have now extended to the use of Blackberries. But this is proving a more frustrating subject of inquiry: for the moment, at least, they remain the electronic toy of the globalising classes and their use defies national categorisation. There are, after all, only so many ways you can read your e-mails in public, many of them rude. Masters of the universe - be they American, German, or British - have a habit of plunking their Blackberries down in front of them in meetings and flicking through their e-mails when others are talking. It is terrible etiquette: the electronic equivalent of looking over someone's shoulder at a party. Culprits deserve punishment: they should be fitted with Russian internal fax machines.
透过手机猜国籍？
一个关于俄罗斯人用手机的笑话
电话铃响起来的时候，三位新派俄罗斯人正坐在一间桑拿室里。其中一位从毛巾里掏出一部小巧圆滑的手机，开始讲话。
接完电话后，他炫耀道：“这是手机科技的最新产品，诺基亚(Nokia)X7832。”
另一部电话响了起来。第二位新派俄罗斯人开始接电话，但却看不到手机在哪儿。
他后来解释道：“我把手机听筒植入了耳垂，把扬声器植入了牙齿。”
第三位新派俄罗斯人开始控制不住地摇晃起来，并发出呼呼的声音。
其它两人问道：“你怎么了？”
“我在收一份传真。”
亚洲手机用户的国别特征
声称我们的世界正越来越趋同，这种说法已成了陈词滥调。据说，全球化和现代科技，正迅速消除着我们国家间的界限和特征。然而，吸引我的却是相反的现象：对全球科技的使用如何如此迅速地呈现出国别特征，就像上文提到的笑话所间接反映出的那样。（我是在上世纪90年代中期，在莫斯科第一次听到这个笑话的，当时手机正成为浮华商人们的时尚佩饰。）
当我负责英国《金融时报》亚洲报道这一令人喜爱的工作时，曾多次利用在机场等候的时间，观察和我一样的乘客，试图猜出他们的国籍。我发现，判断国籍的一个最可靠的方法，就是观察他们使用手机的方法。
中国人会不顾旁人，直接对着电话大喊大叫。他们腰间通常别着两部（有时是三部）手机。相反，日本人则是彬彬有礼的典范，他们会小声地讲话，而且通常会把另一只手捂在话筒上，以免影响其他乘客。这让我联想到，有时侯日本人在乘坐公共交通工具时还会戴上口罩，这是为了避免把感冒传染给他人。韩国人会把他们的三星(Samsung)手机用一根绳挂在脖子上。菲律宾人则更爱发短信，而不打电话。
欧洲手机用户的国别特征
过去一年来，我一直留心观察欧洲的手机用户，并得出了以下结论（纯属非学术性研究）。任何一位讲电话时习惯于用手指拨弄头发的男性，都可能是法国人。俄罗斯男性和中国人一样，喜欢对着电话高声喊叫，仿佛是想吓跑一只熊，即便是当他们和妻子或情人交谈时也是一样――或许可能更甚。意大利人通电话时手势翻飞，一下就能辨认出来。我曾在米兰机场见过一位排队的意大利乘客，我当时确信他是一名乐队指挥，正在练习斯卡拉歌剧院(La Scala)威尔第(Verdi)歌剧的某段狂野乐章，后来我才意识到：他不过在是讲免提电话。英国人通电话有两种类型：要么自负地用高分贝声音扯着嗓子嚷嚷，要么自觉地避开人群，找个不受干扰的地方。
学术界已经在研究这一课题――这或许不会让你感到惊讶。让人满足的是，他们的一些分析研究结果，似乎与我不经意的观察结论相符。
安帕罗?拉森(Amparo Lasen)博士比较了伦敦、马德里、巴黎三地人群在公共场合使用手机的情况，结果发现在不同国家的文化中，手机赋予了“静止时间和过渡空间新的含义”。安帕罗?拉森是马德里卡姆鲁滕斯大学(Complutense University)社会学讲师。
因此，比如 “生活”在街上的马德里人，通常在公共场合讲话就像在家里一样自由，而且无论身在何处，几乎总是会接听电话。巴黎人将公共场合视为表演舞台，而手机只不过扮演了另一种道具。拉森注意到，独自坐在巴黎咖啡馆里的法国女性几乎总是在讲电话，或卖弄式地把手机放在身边的桌子上。而伦敦人往往将街道视为临时的功能性场所。他们不会长时间闲逛，边走边讲电话。他们明显地更乐于屏蔽来电，或使用语音邮件。
全球化将战胜国别特征？
不过，在2002年和2004年进行的两次比较性实地研究之后，拉森的结论是：这三个城市的手机使用习惯变得越来越相似了。或许全球化终将战胜国别特征吧。她的确注意到，人们对于在公共场合使用手机的容忍度明显提高。“对新奇事物，人们有一种抵触反应，人们对它不信任。但当他们自己也开始用手机的时候，他们变得更能容忍，认识也发生了变化，”她表示，“在美国，手机出现得比欧洲晚一些，那里仍存在更多的抵触。美国人认为手机不适合在学校和其它公共场所使用――还曾试图禁止在这些场合使用手机。”
我本人的业余人类学研究，现已扩展到了黑莓(Blackberry)的使用情况。不过，事实证明，这是一个更令人灰心的调查课题：至少就目前而言，它们仍然还只是全球化阶层的电子玩具，对它的使用还无法按照国别分类。毕竟，能够当众阅读电子邮件的方式也就这么多，其中很多都是无礼的。这些宇宙间的主宰――不管他们是美国人、德国人还是英国人――有一个习惯，就是在开会时“砰”的一声把黑莓扔到桌上，在别人发言的时候，浏览自己的电子邮件。这是一种严重的失礼：相当于在聚会上无视别人。这么干的人应受到以下惩罚：应该给他们装上俄罗斯式的体内传真机。
本文作者是英国《金融时报》欧洲编辑
