When was the last time any of you used a phonecard? Not prepaid mobile cards, but real phonecards to be used on public payphones?

Yesterday? Last month? Last year? A decade ago?!

I started using my first mobile phone when I was about 18...so the last time I probably used a phonecard was at least a good 7 years ago. Phonecards? Who needs them nowadays when you've got bundled free calls? Only foreign workers and primary school kids have use for them.

Until, I realised the usefulness of a prepaid phonecard.

Which I am about to use very soon, in less than an hours' time.

Nevermind the inconvenience, and the possible queue & waiting time for me to use the payphone. My privacy, which comes in the form of keeping my mobile number unknown to boys & girls I don't like to hear from after office hours, is priceless.

But unfortunately, the cost of my privacy is not exactly priceless - it comes in the form of $5.25 monthly if I want to privatise my number and why would I want to inconvenience my loved ones who would like to know that I am calling them? No reason at all.

When it takes so long for me to get the office phone into my hands, I'll turn to the good ol' phonecard. I hope that's more reliable than a coin phone. This evening, I spent about 5 minutes punching the same telephone number into a coin phone, only to have the makcik at the store tell me the phone is faulty.

Thank goodness for cardphones, I can't wait to go back to basics in a while!

...

And just when I thought my Monday was not going on too well, I received another plastic card in the mail. And so the first purchase goes to...?