Her house was somewhere that all the men could go and just play cards, drink, have a good time and be relieved of all the stress from the day. Her house was always full of men just having a good time and fulfilling their sexual desires with Im. Now that the telephone was around, people stopped going to Im Kaleem"s house. They spent all their time sitting by the phone. This was harmful for the town and its community. It tore people away from each other. Also, for Accawi, the telephone was "bad news." He had a little business of running errands for the older men. He would sit outside of Im Kaleem"s house and wait for a man to call to him so he could run errands for him. The men would pay him a small amount of money each time. In this sense, the telephone was "bad news." .

             The telephone also brought many opportunities to the town of Magdaluna. People would receive phone calls from people with job openings. As time went by, more and more villagers left the village in pursuit of a more sophisticated and technological way of living. "The army took them. Jobs and cities lured them. And ships and airplanes carried them to such far away places as Australia and Brazil and New Zealand" (37). The people left in large swarms and for Accawi, this was devastating. However, the telephone gave many people opportunities to advance their lives. Accawi can complain about not being able to live the life that he had once known and loved; however, he moved away himself. His father got a good job with an oil company. Accawi graduated from a school in Sedan on a scholarship and is now living in the United States. Accawi was given a very good opportunity to advance his life.

             Although Accawi may have enjoyed living the simple life, he was brought an opportunity of a lifetime because of the telephone. While the telephone brought much grief to the town, it also provided a sense of technology and advancement.