A phone number is just a number but its significance lies in who or where it connects you to. To a simple guy, a girl’s phone number could mean his next wife. To a simple girl, it could mean her prince charming. And to an individual in a foreign country, it could mean food, shelter, and clothing. The ability to understand foreign phone numbers can be a crucial one, particularly if they are the phone numbers of a foreign country you will be spending some time.
What Was That I Just Touched?
You are obviously used to dealing with the phone number systems in your country. Unless you are within the same continental or geographical location, chances are that the instance you step into another country, things won’t necessarily be the same. Just as much as the way of life will change the instance you set foot in another country, so will the phones numbers as well as the phone number systems.
Things may seem very different at first but there is no need to worry. Things are not as bad as you think unless you have some kind of OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder). If you are like the rest or majority of humankind, adjusting to a new locale should be a piece of cake.
Besides, it’s not as if you will be calling the entire country or even an entire neighborhood. The key to adjusting well to the phone number system of a foreign country is by starting with a phone number from that country, which means something to you. If you don’t have any, and are single – male or female – try to get a phone number of the member of the opposite sex that you would genuinely like to get to know. Furthermore, if you are completely new to even the language of the foreign country, there is no better way of starting to learn its language. After all, the best way of learning a new language is by dating a native speaker.
Once you have the number, it is as simple as calling the person it links you to. You could sit down and check it out while comparing it to the ones in your own country. What similarities are there? What differences are there? This a good method that you can use to identify the pattern used in the phone number system of a foreign country.
As you already know, there are different phone numbers for different scenarios. There are personal numbers for things like cell phones, others are used for special calls like when you call the police or a government body in a country, others are used for landline calls, and others for business purposes. They may not all be important to you right off the bat since there are others you’ll never have to use, but it helps to know what is useful to you.
Be that as it may, to understand the phone number effectively, you actually have to sit down and study it against a reference that was created solely to help foreigners and those new to the phone number system of the country.
You don’t have to know which numbers are which or where they are used but at least be smart enough to notice the kind of number you have. Maybe the girl or guy whose number you just took gave you a fake number. Knowing the different phone numbers would help you to determine whether the number is a landline, cell phone, business related, or perhaps they gave you the number to the local police (assuming they figured you were not a local and thought you were lost and needed help). Imagine calling a number in a foreign country and the first thing you here is the inquiry of what your emergency is. What will you say?
In a nutshell, when you go to a foreign country or when you call a number from a foreign country, at least know the kind of phone number you’ll be dealing with. You don’t have to know all the phone number systems being used there. At least, just know the nature of the one you will be dialing often, even if it’s just to order pizza.
