Holla Holla Holla!!!

It's common courtesy when you enter a meeting, a library, or a quiet place of some sort, to switch off your cell phone, or at least mute the sound. In fact, it's usually the first thing I tend to do when I walk into one of those rooms. Habit, I guess. And silly me, I assumed this was pretty common almost anywhere you go. But reporters here seem to believe they're above this conventional rule. At first, I thought it was a natural mistake, when sitting in a nearly silent press conference one day about gender discrimination, I all of a sudden hear Sean Paul's "Shake that thang, Miss nananana Shake that thang...." and realize I don't have my Ipod on (ummm, not that that song would be on it, pfffh, nervous laugh) but it is in fact somebody's catchy cell phone ring. I give a little smirk, feeling bad for the person who MUST be pretty embarrassed they forgot to turn it off beforehand. But a few minutes later, I hear again, "Shake that thang, miss nananana, Shake that thang," and not only does the person NOT shut it off, but actually answers the phone and proceeds to talk loudly in Swahili during the news conference. All this while the TV and radio journalists are trying desperately to record what the government is saying about women's repression in Kenya. Sean Paul will no doubt add a lovely soundtrack to that clip, I'm sure.
A few days later at yet ANOTHER press conference (we go to a lot of them), even more phones started going off. And the guilty parties proceeded to answer them and have conversations without even bothering to step out of the small room. And let me tell you, they do not know how to use their "indoor" voices! But nobody says anything or even shoots them a look. And what's more, nobody has a simple phone ring anymore. They will find the most unreasonable, obscure sound...and set it as their signature own. I've heard rings that sound like a bull frog "ribitting", the sound of babies crying (WHY would anyone want to listen to that if they didn't have to?) and my personal favourite, and what I believed was not just set to ring, but to ring LOUDLY, 50 Cent's ' "Ayo, I'm tired of using technology, why don't you sit down on top of me, Ayo....". Has ANYONE HERE heard of the vibrate setting????? Just wondering.