Three Wise Men and the Unrelenting Power of Communication

A few weeks ago I was at a restaurant with my parents. Like every other modern family, we buried our faces in our smartphones after the waiter was done taking our order. Having read that constant phone face-burial can cause neck problems, I habitually raised my head to stretch my neck, before going back into aforementioned phone face-burial. But before that, I glanced at three men sitting at the table next to ours. At the first sight, it was any three middle-aged friends reuniting over beer and chicken. It was then that I noticed something strange about them.

They were not using words, instead their hands and faces to talk to each other. Noticing the number of empty beer mugs on their table, I figured this could be a novel drinking game they were playing - no words, only dumb charades. But the sight intrigued me so much I could not take my eyes away from them. Thanks to the humdrum service of the restaurant, I still had about half an hour before my food could take my eyes and ears off the three men.

I looked at my parents - their phone screens were locked, and eyes were locked too - on the three men doing wild hand and face gestures. It was as if they were discussing everything but not with words - current events, the beer, the chicken and how fat they had become, all so silently.

My dad was the first to react, "They are so drunk!" But then nothing about them seemed drunk, except for the alcohol that kept coming to their table in brightly coloured bottles that housed our favourite fizzy golden drink.

It was then that it struck me - they were mute. After a few seconds of shock, this new knowledge upped my interest by several notches. It was so amusing to look at them, and trying to make out what they were saying with their animated faces and hand gestures. So much that I almost hated the waiter who interrupted the session by bringing food to our table (within fifteen minutes of us placing the order, I take my 'humdrum service' remark back) and asking one of the men if they would like to order rice.

'Such a mean thing to do. Doesn't he know they cannot speak?'

What happened next shocked me again. The person who was asked the question motioned to the other two and said to the waiter, "No, thank you. Just get the check please."

I hid my face to avoid him seeing me staring at them in disbelief. He then spoke to his friend sitting next to him that he was going to the washroom, curling his four fingers in the universally known hand signal for peeing, with his little finger outstretched. The third friend gave him a thumbs up.

That's when it struck me. Only one of them was deaf and mute. The other two were able to hear and talk perfectly! They were only talking in hand gestures for their third friend to feel included and participate equally in their discussion.

My respect for them and their friendship soared after learning this. We take our abilities so much for granted that it is only when we see people who are devoid of these abilities that we are able to appreciate them, albeit for a few moments. After a while even the second friend got off the table to talk a call, leaving the third friend at the table to finish his meal. It was then that a waiter stood by the third man and motioned him asking how his food was. He responded almost instantly motioning that the chicken was superb (doing a double thumbs up) while the fish was 'so-so' (shaking his palm horizontally). This review also reinforced my belief in my ordering skills, because I had ordered chicken and not fish that day. The other waiters stood at a distance watching the waiter place his hand on his heart acknowledging the man's feedback, and clear the plates. The three friends soon left the restaurant, happy-high and with arms around each other.

To say that our daily functions would not take place without some or the other means of communication is not an overstatement. Our body functions because nerve cells take signals from one part to another, we function at work and home because there's someone who tells us what to do. Humans have been communicating via various means since times immemorial - from tablets and walls with pictorial messages to the secret code languages we created in school. We have also reached a point in time where we have sent signals into space to notify extra-terrestrial life about our existence.

Communication has the strength to make or break nations, and that has not dwindled even with the rapid progress of technology. This also places immense responsibility on communication to be right and succinct, or else we have myriad ways to misinterpret long-winded communication in the most horrible ways possible.

Ever since that evening we make it a point at all family dinners to leave our phones face-down on the table, on silent mode at least during our meal, so that we respect the gift of communication that has been bestowed upon us, while also realizing how amazing the people in our family are, as a bonus.