The ugliest weasel everI was wondering around Game Pavilion today, and noticed that they're selling dirt cheap Vodacom starter packs. The same starter pack that's valued at R149 when you buy a new phone, is selling for R4.99. Per pack they make a big loss, but they count on the fact that you're going to activate it and make a whole bunch of long distance calls to your cousin in London.

Buy one, and use it to back up your phone numbers in case your cell gets lost, stolen or goes swimming. It's easy - first make sure all your numbers are stored on your phone's memory. On a Nokia, the menu option is Phone Book->Copy->From SIM to phone->All->Keep original. This will make a copy of all your names and numbers and put them onto your phone's internal storage. Remember that this won't work for jurassic bricks or the really cheap phones, as they don't have internal memory.

Next, take your SIM out and put in your new R4.99 pay-as-you-go SIM that you just bought from Game. Don't worry that it's not activated and doesn't get signal, the SIM works perfectly as storage. This time, choose Phone book->Copy->From Phone to SIM->All->Keep original, and presto, you will have a backup of all your important contacts!

Most people will lose a phone in their lifetime. Getting all your numbers back will be a bitch so don't say I never warned you. And don't tell Vodacom I'm sure it violates some kind of acceptable use policy or something... :)