Dialing the Wrong Number

Posted by Yuka as Hot Cities

Have you ever counted how many times that you put up a phone slowly, dial the number carefully, wait to be answered devoutly, but finally hear a strange voice talking, be told you have dialed the wrong number, sometimes even receive some scolding as well, and then listen to the ‘du-du’ sound laughing at you? It was quite common to dial the wrong number or to receive a wrong call a couple years ago, since people had to press many buttons to call someone, and they did not know who was calling while the scream of the telephone was occupying the whole room. Careless guys like me often fell into such conditions.

There was one telephone number where I often made mistakes. It was one of my classmates, Greed’s phone number. ‘Good morning?’ For some times a gentleman answered the phone. ‘Goo… Good morning,’ I tried my best to be as polite as he was; ’may I speak to Greed?’ He was silent for a moment, and said, ’would you please have your number again?’ Dial the number again?! Was that a reply? I had never got an answer like that. But I did so, finally I acquired connected with Greed. It was not until I put down the telephone receiver did I realized what had happened to the first call and learnt what the sentence ‘would you please have your number again?’ meant. That was, definitely, I had dialed the wrong number. However, I didn’t feel a bit sad, for I received understanding, politeness and a chance to correct mistakes, and he was the first man who answered a wrong call patiently, who hung up slightly after suggesting that he wasn’t the very man the caller wanted without any complaint that I had ever seen.

Nevertheless, once people have had a smart small cellphone, and telephone companies have provided their customers with the function of showing the number of incoming calls in order to meet their customers’ requirement, things have changed radically. Now, every time the telephone rings, people can accept best wishes from their relatives and friends while be free from those annoying salesman talking without stop. And no matter when people want to call somebody, what they only need to do is to find the particular number from the contact book in their cellphone, press a mere green button and no longer have any worries of being mistaken, except for that man having changed the phone number without informing.

Some people, especially those who you don’t meet often, making phone calls may probably be the only way to keep in touch with each other. It would be a disaster for you if they forgot, or they failed to tell you the new number they change. It was at Chinese New Year’s Eve when I was sending messages of celebration to all my friends. Shortly after each message was sent out, I received a call, and my telephone revealed that it was Siger, one of my friends who I got to know in a summer gathering in the UK, calling. ‘Hello,’ I said, ‘happy new year!’ ‘Hello,’ the voice sounds strange, ‘who are you?’ Suddenly I could say nothing, he was not Siger! Then who was he? Was it all right to tell a stranger who I was? If not, what should I do? While I was silent, thinking about questions above, he said something I could not understand a bit, maybe that was his mother tongue. ‘You sent me a message just now,’ he spoke Mandarin first, ‘so I wonder who you are.’ Oh, I had sent a message to the wrong person. Really? I chose the number from the contact book in my cellphone, it could not have been wrong, but facts were such that actions spoke louder than words, and what could I do? ‘We… Well, I guess I’ve sent you the message by mistake,’ I said hurriedly, ‘but wish you good luck in the coming year as well.’ ‘Hmm, okay,’ he said, ‘happy new year.’ Then he hung up. I sat there with a blank mind, and finally I realized that Siger had changed his phone number without telling me. And I was not able to get in touch with him ever since.

There times when you still could not call the person you wanted though you had armed with such high-tech tools and had known the right number, which confused you a lot. It proved to be the telephone company’s fault, for I, from time to time, called my mother — the number I would never forget or cause any errors, but a strange unknown woman answered the phone. Seconds later, I hung up shamefacedly and dial the same number again; this time was my real mum. At the time I learnt that Mum had not allowed anyone to answer the phone for her, and had not even received a single call, every one could guess that I was insulting the telecommunication office sharply though I didn’t show any expressions.

I am such a careless boy that I have almost made mistakes in every number of my friends’, BUT there is one number which I have never made any mistakes, which I never ever call wrong, which I will never ever, ever cause any errors, and which is equally vital to my parents’ phone number. That’s Jin’s, she’s my Angel. I have just one mere sight of her phone number, but it stays stoutly in my mind.