Oh! Colombo 

Communication, gossiping and maligning on the phone is almost passé. All these newfangled apps provide groups of people much easier communication which results in lots of fun and prompt responses. WhatsApp was just a fun app where one spent times exchanging pictures and messages. Soon it became popular for group chats which allowed those with smartphones that have cameras and video capabilities to forward an instant picture or video from a party, cocktail, conference, wedding and other events; all of this at minimal cost. 

Such fun apps have moved to another level where the group chats have now become gossip centers to chat on and pass on information to the others of the group, especially if they are not all together at a function. It is fun and at the same time quite vicious as loads of slander go on in such chats. It has become a common sight at functions, restaurants and group gatherings, funerals included, to see smartphones being used for selfies, photographs and mini videos – absolutely unacceptable but goes on without compunction. The funny thing is that one can be at home and watch a live stream of an event which somehow makes you feel inclusive. 

It is also quite comic that most groupies in the group chats are on many groups and whilst praising a person in one group they are slandering and laughing at the same person with another group. The problems begin when in all the excitement the wrong chat group gets the message and all hell breaks loose. The revenge of course is then blocking the person from the chat line as well as from Facebook. 

Recently a young bride who had stepped out of her marriage in the last hour and was complaining of her husband’s misdeeds announced to us that she had finally finished off with him and blocked him from her Facebook account and all her chat lines to make him understand that she was serious. This really dumbfounded my friend Andre and I who were subjected to this monologue at a beach restaurant where we had planned on enjoying a peaceful breakfast. 

This is the new and real world we now live in and all of us who are yet old fashioned have to come to terms with it and decide on whether we want to either catch up or be left behind.