The Cell-Hell game

The long Easter weekend is finally over. Ostensibly, a time for inner reflection and quality family time, the Easter Bunny somehow always manages to leave parents of young children broken and heading for the booze bottle.

At least I am not alone. After trying to keep small kids quiet during mass, saving the home from sugar-rush ruin and attempting to hold onto sanity, a few of my parent friends got together on Sunday night to have a well-deserved drink.

Recalling the days when we were about a decade - or two - younger, we decided we really needed to indulge in a drinking game or two. Except the only one we could remember was coinage and frankly I was not about to subject my solid oak coffee table to such abuse.

And then the dulcet tones of the Violent Femmes (remember them) singing Blister in the Sun (80s rock anthem) emerged from my cellphone.

While I was trying to disengage my mother from discussing the latest fad in gardening/cordon bleu cooking/parenting, my friends dashed to their phones to check they hadn't missed a missive from the real (non-parenting) world.

And this was how we got into a discussion about the terrible quality of calls across all networks. (Yes, one of my friends is a Virgin Mobile subscriber, for the simple reason that sometimes she wishes she had remained a virgin - much to her partner's chagrin.)

My best friend's hubby decided this could be a great premise for a drinking game. We all had cellphones, so why not punish the person with full reception with a noxious alcoholic beverage - ie a quarter glass of good chardonnay.

Of course, no one drank because no one had full reception. And no, I do not live in some rural backwater; I fit quite comfortably in suburbia.

We're young, we're savvy and we can still embrace the benefits of the technology era, we said.

Kimberly Guest, senior journalist, ITWeb

Having stared dejectedly at our top of the range cellular devices for a few seconds, we decided there must be a way to use the common cellphone for drinking games. We're young, we're savvy and we can still embrace the benefits of the technology era, we said.

One - well-insured - guy suggested tossing our phones at the wall until one broke. I suspect he was due for an upgrade. Of course, this "idea" received the scorn it deserved. Another suggested an SMS competition to see who could use the teeny-tiny keyboard the best, but we couldn't agree on a message, or whether predictive text should be allowed. And besides, some had left their reading glasses at home.

Then I suggested speed dialling. We would all choose a person within the circle to call and the first call to be successfully connected would win and all others drink.

This idea sort of worked. Calls were made and most got the busy signal as that person was also dialling. Ultimately though, a call would get through.

For me, however, it wasn't that successful. I dialled my hubby - on my speed dial - and got the message: "The number you have dialled does not exist." I must admit, I was not pleased.

As a journalist, I have tried to establish the cause of our shoddy cellular networks on several occasions. Once I've recovered from the gumpf-induced hangover, I usually realise I know less than when I started on the crusade. If it's not denials, you can be sure that you will not be able to see for all the finger-pointing.

One cellular company has come clean though and that's MTN. It plans to spend R30 billion (that's many zeros) in the coming year on infrastructure improvements which will deal with congestion and quality of service on its networks. SA has been allocated R7 billion (one less zero) of this spend, so we should see improvements in this network.

The company's group CEO and president, Phuthuma Nhleko, told me shortly after his results presentation that this capital expenditure was essential.

"It's not a nice to have, we need more capacity. This is not a hobby," he said (rather sternly).

However, I can't help wondering if MTN would have fessed up on its network difficulties if it wasn't compelled to inform shareholders of such a significant spending programme on infrastructure. Personally, I doubt it; after all they - like their cellular and fixed-line competitors - have left it to a point where call quality is under significant pressure.

Of course, if we were in the US, the consumers would be in uproar by now, demanding to have their bills reduced and calling the companies to task.

But in good ole SA, we consider how we can turn throwing our cellphones against brick walls into a drinking game. The drunken haze at least provides us with a brief respite from our connection woes.

Additional note: The writer welcomes submissions of drinking games which do not result in the demolishing of household goods.