Telephone chat lines may be proliferating in most parts of the world, but in the conservative society of the Gulf, their days are probably numbered. The advertisements for them appear on the Gulf satellite TV channels in English, Arabic and Chinese.

Picturing seductively-clad Asian girls on the phone, they come on at night during the screening of feature films. Most are targetting bored and lonely teenagers.

But when Gulf viewers dial certain phone numbers, they're often shocked at the obscene conversations they find themselves listening to. Residents in the United Arab Emirates have told the local paper, Gulf News, that such language was totally against their Muslim culture.

One Pakistani went so far as to say that his culture did not allow such free chatting between men and women. Yet, for many Gulf teenagers, the phone lines are a chance to express their views to callers from different societies.

But the calls don't come cheap. Unlike the internet, they're charged at international rates, often terminating thousands of miles away, in the Pacific ocean.