This paper deals with the implications of the socialness of private communication. Drawing upon ethnographic observations of first time mobile phone users in Rah, an island in Vanuatu, we revisit the debate on how the mo- bile phone reconfigures private and personal communication. Our observations show how the advent of the mobile phone disrupts and challenges existing prac- tices around how private communication is managed on the island. These ob- servations are used to open up a design space where we explore the socialness of personal, private communication. Drawing on the analysis, we discuss three directions for future thinking of mobile interaction design: (1) designing for spatial awareness; (2) designing for transience and (3) designing with temporal- ity. We expand on these to discuss the notion of digital patina, which we argue, is an exciting topic to explore for the design of personal, social communication.