Cell Phones

China Mobile dominates when it comes to cell phone coverage here.  Granted they do a pretty good job.  I usually get service in elevators, in all buildings, even on most subways.  They make getting a cell phone and making it work very cheap and easy.  The first day of work with NBC they gave us all cellphones with unlimited minutes (I was pretty stoked about it and still am enjoying the free service.)  The first in-office crisis we faced was: setting up voicemail.  This was the first thing all the reporters and photogs wanted to do, but of course here in China, they don't believe in voicemails.  This was a hard concept for many of them to grasp at first, but soon you realize texting is way more efficient anyway.  There a couple special little characteristics of the phones here when you are making a call.  Most chinese people pride themselves in having really schnazy phones, so they want to use all the cool gadgets such as ring backs (I think thats what they're called.)  When you make a call, instead of hearing it ring, you hear ring backs – these horrible little songs that play on repeat until someone picks up.  Another wonderful part of making calls is when someone is busy or they don't pick up.  That's when you get this recorded message that first speaks chinese, but then in english and says, "the subscriber you've called is busy now please try again later."  Usually when I hear this message I want to chuck my phone against a wall...it frustrates me a bit.  But, today I got a new message that I've never heard before and this is a direct quote, "sorry the subscriber you've dialed is power off."   It's wonderful Chinglish like this that makes my day a little brighter.