I type as I would write, younger relatives texts often do not make sense to me, but am learning with some help.
I think the “recording it” as a Voice Message or Text instead of phoning so that the recipient can listen to it when convenient to them makes sense, especially when you are in a different time zone to them.
My eldest Sis is 78 now - not quite an old fogey - she is still working - but a combination of arthritic fingers and squinting at a tiny phone screen makes her prefer to use the microphone on her Smartphone to dictate messages instead of typing them.
She spends the Winter months working in a warmer climate in a different time zone to her Brit family and friends - when she is at leisure to catch up with her family, they are often at work or in bed asleep - when we are at leisure to chat to her, she is often busy at work or in bed asleep, so it’s tricky to coordinate convenient times to have a chat by telephone. Keeping in touch via Text and WhatsApp messages means we can open and read or listen to messages when it is convenient for us.
I see that your sis and yourself adopted the way of communicating as I do with my sis for the very same reason. (apart from the arthritic fingers). Although we also have real time phone conversation as I am sure you do too. 
Yes, some languages require a different keyboard. I have a separate USB keyboard for when writing Hebrew.
Amazon.com: Hebrew & English Bilingual Language Keyboard (Black) (USB) (Windows) : Electronics
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I fear that face to face conversation is going to be a thing of the past soon…
“It’s society Jim, but not as we know it”… 
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Some good news Foxy, at least on a personal level.
I’ve been invited for an interview/chat with a new recruitment agency tomorrow.
They already have my CV submitted online but they actually suggested that we should meet in person I’m actually going to be filling out a form in biro 
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It is true but on the other hand it is also fabulous that parents can chat with their kids, for free , and face to face , in real time even when they study at the other end of the world.
I remember a time when calling Europe from Asia costed one pound per minute. 
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Good luck Chilli, fingers crossed for you 
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Thank you Mags , much appreciated!
I have a translator app on my cell. It works pretty good. I use Chinese, Korean. Russian, and Japanese translation but it has hundreds of languages.
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Good Luck, Chilliboot - I’m sure you’ll walk it! 
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Bingo. Dumb dumb. Has just found the Latest Model.
With large keys.
All the way 2 The Gym !!
Yep, hard to believe that I used to have to book a call to the UK at Christmas to speak to my relatives and it was very strictly limited to 3 minutes.
These days I can call my brother in the the UK, friends in Asia or the USA, talk for hours and it is included in my normal plan ($230 for the year)
I used a phone very similar to that in the late 1980s when I visited the UK. My brother gave it to me to use, he was an Executive Engineer for BT mobile service.
Was driving my mother from Kent to Glasgow overnight when we heard on the radio about the Lockerbie air crash so we used the phone to call my brother to find out whether it would affect us (it did).
When he rang back with the information we had no idea how to answer the phone, in our panic we did eventually press the right button but it was touch and go.
Lol Bruce where you in Taiwan by any chance?
Because when I was in Taiwan that was exactly that, you needed to book a phone call to Europe in advance and it was limited to 3 minutes maximum, so you had to think hard and quickly of what you had to say!
I certainly remember when long distance calls cost a fortune and were crackly and hard to hear - hard for me as a child to hear, not sure older relatives heard much at all.
and of course no Skype, Face time etc
and one could send a letter - even the best airmail took about 10 days to get each way so a question would take 3 weeks to get an answer
Modern email, messenger etc are wonderful.
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Even worse was when telecommunications used satellites, there was a noticeable delay on the line so much so that either party would start talking over the other. These days with terrestrial fibre the delay is hardly detectable.
I don’t have a smartphone either….just a basic calls and texts one.
But that means I can’t get into the Millennium stadium or buy concert tickets from Ticketmaster because of the use of apps that require you own one.
Can’t get a printable ticket sent to my e-mail in a Pdf!
I have discussed this with the Welsh Rugby Union but their attitude is buy one or come with someone you know who does!
If every ticketing agency ends up going down this route I will be forced to succumb!
But I do check if my intended bus or train is on time before leaving the house.
But you won’t find me standing at a bus stop staring at a phone!
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Although I love my phone, I rarely take it anywhere with me. I don’t need to make calls. It’s a toy but I don’t need to play with it at bus stops. And I don’t trust it enough to use it for banking/paying for things, I have a Bank Card for that, smaller, easier to carry. I wouldn’t even use it at home to log on to my internet banking, I don’t know the first thing about what security there is on the little device.
BTW London Bus Stops have live updates on arrival times.
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I guess you’ll never convince an old luddite like me, there is nobody who I regularly communicate with who isn’t within walking distance. No relatives except my daughter (one glance of her smiling happy face is worth a hundred texts or face time…whatever that is) who visits me once a week with her hubby and number two grand daughter. Number one grand daughter visits about once a year (her choice, she’s always very busy) and lives about 150 miles away, some manager or something and her partner is a high rolling barrister with plenty of brass.
I’ve been forced to have a smartphone by all you lot who have accepted the new technology with open arms making it impossible (or very difficult) to be part of a world without a smartphone. Unfortunately, you have allowed the world to be controlled by the latest tech stuff which will come back to bite you on the arse in the future…
And finally, I (like many others of my generation) remember a time when you could leave your house with some folding stuff in your wallet, fags and lighter in your pocket and no worries…
