In the last two minutes, Hina (name changed) checked her cell phone at least five times. This tendency has earned her the much-coveted title of "Injured from too much text-messaging" on the social networking site, the Facebook. It is probably also the reason why she is often heard complaining about having pain in her fingers.

"How am I supposed to know what’s going on without my phone?" Jane demanded, as she furiously typed on her phone keypad which screamed for mercy with every jab. Keypad, as much as I would love to rescue you, I dare not take the risk.

Cell phones have become extensions of ourselves; another limb so to say, without which we feel crippled and curtailed, incomplete and unfinished, handicapped and hindered. What else is there to provide that comforting bulge in our pockets, to fill up that empty space in our hand bags, to be that something we can fiddle with in the dark hours of boredom?

Cell phones with cameras, cell phones with walkmans, cell phone cum ipods, cell phones with two Sims, cell phone with camcorders, cell phones with MP3 players, cell phone with TVs, cell phones with sandwich-makers, cell phone with laser beams!! These handy little gadgets will get you out of any technological rut.

Besides, everybody’s got one. After all, who has the power to resist Shan’s smiling, reassuring face here, or Ali Zafar’s dashing dancing moves or Iman Ali’s suggestion to 'join us’? And what about the promises of "full time masti, non-stop fun"?

It is not just adults and teenagers who suffer from this addiction and lack of resistance--children, too (*gasps*) have fallen victims to the cell phone syndrome, something I discovered while volunteering at a summer camp this year.  

"The tooth fairy brought me a cell phone when I lost my first tooth," Salman, who is only nine years old, disclosed thoughtfully.

"My father promised me that I would get his phone when he got an N95," Moiz, 10, told me. Parents really should carefully weigh out the pros and cons before buying cell phones for their young ones.

However, my favourite has got to be this one:

"For showing off," Zamin, an 11-year-old boy, declared the purpose of keeping a slick cell, proudly checking out his reflection in the deliciously shiny black surface of his Nokia N81 (which, as he later informed me, cost Rs.35,000!). At this, I casually slipped my battered, second hand, woefully inexpensive Sony Ericsson K750i back into my handbag.

 *Beep*