oh ivan, darling, if i did not know you, i think i'd have to invent you.
we went for dinner last saturday, i have only seen the guy 3 times since we came back from our trip together. last year, we would see each other 3 times a week at the least, which was fine by me because we truly get along. anyhow, i think i overdosed a bit after our 24/7 stretch this summer and it was a bit hard for me to do things with him afterwards. so we had our beijing duck and spoke our little invented language, a mix of french-english-mandarin. that's what happens when two geeks spend a bit too much time together.
we're about to leave the restaurant and the waitress brings us fortune cookies. of course, they give the cookies to foreigners and the chinese get oranges to balance their Qi. they understand foreigners enough to know that we want something sweet after our meal. we break open our cookies and read the messages. mine says i'll have a wonderful life, which is both a great and insipid wish.
ivan opens his and says: soon a great friendship will evolve into true love. he looks at me and i look away.
this morning in my email box, i get a strange email from a random company that informs me that a 'secret admirer' is sending me a virtual kiss... or some shit like that. i think of ivan and his fortune cookie.
later, i get an email from him where he apologizes for sending me such silliness. he was tricked, he said, into beliving this thing would work.
i am amused by his clumsiness. it is almost charming.
---
open for debate:
do you think technology facilitates or impedes in our ability to develop open communications with other people?
posted by cynicalcosmopolitan @ 12:07 PM
4 comments
4 Comments:
My initial thought would be that it facilitates communication. After thinking about it for about 10 more seconds, I wonder if I would be forced to develop better communication skills in other mediums if I couldn't use technology. Hmmm.
I guess my final answer is that it's not a bad thing, and since it is there we might as well take advantage of it. And of course the futher the distance between people the more it enhances the ability to keep it going.
yes, i agree.
though i wonder if our face-to-face communication skills are deteriorating, as a result. sometimes it is easier to express yourself (thoughts, deepest feelings) by e-mail, for instance, but it is also easy to hurt, lash out, deceive or cut off others because of the lack of direct contact. and i wonder whether that means our ability to empathize, to feel someone's pain and our motivation to do something for others are fading. i think its a bit dangerous to assume that the cyberspace relationship being facilitated is same as a face-to-face relationship. but there are people who find their life partners in cyberspace so.
sahi
i feel like i have to write two separate answers, though i'm not sure if you realize how much your arguments intersect.
m:
i'll reply to your second reflection a couple of entries above.
s:
i was trying to compare my relationship with people i talk & write to with those of friends i just talk to. qualitatively, i believe they are quite different. i think writing is good for me, in a sense, because of that extra minute i get to thing about things a bit more deeply... instead of blurting out whatever nonsense is going through my mind at the time.
i wonder how much we'd be different were it not for our writing to each other (when you were in mtl and now that you are back in jpn). still i truly feel the limit of our online communication and would give anything for coffeetime with s.! meanwhile, i'm terrible when it comes to writing letters so i'm rather happy that you are just a few clicks of the mouse away.
love,
-j.
yes, they do relate (the arguments) because i wouldnt have written what i wrote if it werent for m's point about being forced to develop communication skills in other mediums.
i find that it is easy to argue that technology facilitates communication because of its convenience and ability to connect across distance instantly. cant deny that has been my experience. (though i realize you have to be somewhat of a "writing" person and be well off enough to have access to that technology) so i purposely argued the opposite side, which i believe there is some truth to, esp when it comes to the kind of connection facilitated (or attempted) purely in cyberspace.
i think that is why a phone call or letter becomes particularly special and valuable. more so now.
on a somewhat diff note, i think its interesting in terms of representation. like, how i dont see or hear you, but i sit in the front of the computer and access your blog to "see" you, for instance.
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