On a Sunday evening, before starting my mission of three days without using modern communications, I publish a notice on my webpage at kaixin (a Chinese social site, similar to Facebook). I also have a landline installed at home and tell friends they can only contact me on my home and work numbers. I pack away my cell phones, and unplug the Internet. I prepare for bed and turn off the light. The Dark Ages begin.
Monday
9:48 am
Damn it! I have slept in. I always use my mobile alarm to wake up 8 am but my cells are locked in the closet, without batteries. Rush to work. So many things I should do today.
10:24 am
Ride the bus to my Beijing office. Bored. Normally call people to arrange interviews during this one-hour trip. Feel alone in the bus. Alone. Have nothing to do. Watch people. A couple fights over spending too much money. Old man struggles to board bus. Little girl gives up seat to pregnant lady: Real people. What a wonderful world.
11:45 am
Start my office computer and automatically reach out to click online. Damn it! Okay. Deal with it. It's nearly lunchtime and I have achieved nothing.
1:35 pm
Research a shopping article for China Daily's Beijing Weekend. Where do you find the coolest running shoes in town? A good friend is PR girl for a big sport shoes company and I have her number on my ... damn it! I forgot to transfer any number from my cell phones onto paper. I have more than 250 numbers. Senior colleagues on the newspaper did suggest I keep a contact book. "What's a contact book?" I ask.
They nod their heads in disbelief.
1.40 pm
I'm a genius because I call 114 (directory assistance) to get the company's front desk number. I wonder if other people have used directory assistance before.
"Hello," says the cold and detached voice of a middle-aged lady.
"Oh, Hi, hello. Can you put me through to Xiao Lunan. Thanks."
I've never spoken to a person at a reception desk. I only use cell numbers and speak directly to the people I want.
Receptionist says nothing and puts me through but Xiao is not at her desk. There is no message answering service. I hang up.
It is the first time I make a landline-to-landline call to a good friend and I fail to connect.
1.42 pm
"Hello," says the front-desk lady again.
"Hi. I just called to contact Xiao, but she is not at the desk. Can you give me her mobile number, please? This is Gan Tian from China Daily. We are friends, and I have something to confirm with her."
"We don't provide any personal mobile numbers here," the lady says without emotion.
"Please. This is urgent."
"If you are a friend of hers, why don't you have her mobile number?"
"I am on a special project and I'm banned from using my mobile phones. Her number is saved in my ..."
Click.
1:44 pm
Postpone my running-shoe story until Thursday when the mobile ban is lifted.
Next. Start a 500-word piece for China Daily's travel series My Hometown. Reporters write about their home provinces, and I'm keen to share my local knowledge about Hengyang, the second largest city of Hunan province.
5:54 pm
After 4 hours, I still cannot finish this simple task because without the Internet I cannot remember that my hometown has 7 million people, is 160 km south of the provincial capital of Changsha and was once called "Wild Goose City". Suddenly, I remember that I have some travel brochures at home that I can use.
7:14 pm
Ride bus home feeling tired and dizzy. Alone. Cannot call any friends to complain. Lonely, I'm so lonely.
8:24 pm
Home alone. Should be chatting happily on MSN with my friends. Instead, I am sitting in my bedroom, watching a boring DVD I bought on my way back home. No phone numbers to call. Lonely, I'm, so lonely.
10:24 pm
Go to bed because sleeping is better than doing nothing. Usually I crash out after midnight.
Tuesday
9:13 am
Big sleep. Feel good. Beijing's sun is shining.
10:24 am
Boss allows me to finish my hometown story at my apartment but travel brochure information is from 2006. I use my home landline. Never done this before. I call the travel bureau office for an update.
"They are all on our websites," says the assistant.
"Oh ... I just can't get online these days. Please, can you do me a favor, and help me find this information?"
He says nothing and I hear him typing. He's using the Web!
Nobody uses paper, which was actually invented by my hometown's most famous man, Cai Lun.
2:24 pm
Call my friend Damon at his office. His number is the only one I can remember.
"Who is this?" he says.
"Hey, it's me! Don't you recognize my voice?"
"Oh my God! Where have you been? We thought you were dead!" he screams.
"Listen, I am on a special project. I can't use mobile phones or the Internet. You have to use this landline number. What's up? Anything funny going on?"
"Anything funny? Everything is funny! You know that stupid guy we met last Friday night is now dating Mendy! We have been discussing it on MSN for days."
Damon says there is party at MIX nightclub, one of Beijing's cool hip-hop clubs.
"Call me when you get to the door and I'll take you in," Damon says.
10:24 pm
At MIX club front door but cannot call Damon. No phone.
"My friend has booked a seat there. Let me in," I say to a doorman.
"Call him and ask him to take you in," the big man says.
I tell him the no-mobile phone story.
The bouncer looks me up and down very strangely. "Sorry then," he says.
10:39 pm
Call Damon from nearby shop. He picks up but the music is deafening.
"Come to the door and get me," I shout.
"Who is this?" Damon says.
One hour later, I get in.
Wednesday
9:36 am
One day to go. Work at home.
11:24 am
Finish hometown story. Would normally e-mail it to travel editor but instead copy the file to a CD and plan to physically hand it over. Realize I won't be in the office today because I must attend a press conference near where I live. Ask my roommate to send story via his e-mail. A tiny voice in head says: "You are breaking the rules."
2:56 pm
At Romanian film festival press conference and spot a hot girl. Want to ask for her number, but give up. Who uses a pen and paper to take down a number? I don't want to look like an idiot.
7:21 pm
Dinner with friends at Pink Loft restaurant. Gossip, fights, and quarrels, but mostly talk about my no-tech mission.
"I want to do that for a while and have no one bother me," Jessie says.
Helen smiles and says my absence is not missed. "He's out of my mind these days," she laughs.
"Okay, I get it. I don't exist if I don't have a mobile phone." I scream.
8:24 pm
I desperately miss Desperate Housewives! I usually watch it the moment it comes out online on Tuesday evening. Now I have to wait! "Eddie is finding out Dave's secrets! She is dead!" I create some plots myself.
10:25 pm
90 minutes to go and there is light ahead!
11:56 pm
Take mobile phones out and connect laptop. Ready to go!
At the stroke of midnight I open my mobile phones and hundreds of messages rush in.
"Lost?"
"Are you dead?"
"Reply to me ASAP!"
"Call me back!"
"Why have you turned off your phone?"
Over the past three days, I completely forget to call my parents and forget to tell them my project. They freak out and nearly call the police.
Maybe if I had called mom, I could have got more real information about my hometown.
During the past three days I missed
a) Two press conferences
b) Several episodes of Desperate Housewives, Gossip Girls, and Lie to Me
c) A small housewarming party, and
d) Kelly Clarkson's latest album. I download the album as soon as I go online. There is a song I love the most, My Life Would Suck Without You.
My life would suck without the Internet and mobile phones. I realize I am addicted to these devices, and they make life easier. I couldn't function at work or at home without them.
Deep-rooted habit
According to the Chinese Ministry of Information Technology, China has about 400 million Internet users and about 600 million mobile phone users. "Most netizens are young people who live in cities," says Hu Zhengrong, China's foremost communications scholar.
For the post-1980 generation, the Internet and mobile phones are must-haves. Wang Xinyu, 18, studying at Beihong Senior High School in Shanghai, spends more than four hours every day on the Internet and easily half-a-day on his mobile phone. "I am addicted to them," says Wang.
Su Gaoshu, a consultant at the Maple Women's Psychological Counseling Center Beijing, says that while the Internet has definitely led to more convenience, communications online and through SMS has worsened the language skills of youth.
"Online messages and SMSes are short and simple, and this can change the structure of the Chinese character system," Su says.
Su says feeling lost without access to the Internet and mobile contact is normal. "When you have formed a habit, you will feel uncomfortable if you are forced to drop it."
Communications scholar Hu says the Internet provides a platform for young people to express their intimate thoughts. "Chinese people are introverted, and they dare not say in the real world what they have nor problems publishing online," Hu says.