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I Don’t Know Who Is Mona Lisa

That’s a confession one of my friends made the other day, when he came over to ask me how to burn MP3s into a CD.

I was shocked. How can someone not know how Mona Lisa or to burn a CD at this time of age?

After my initial shock, I was even shocked by my own ignorance.

Initially he came over to ask me to help him burn some MP3s he gotten from his friend into a CD so he can listen to them in a car. A good selection of classic Kenny G, Celine Dion, Jim Brickman, Boyzone.

He asked me, “Can a laptop copy MP3s into a CD?”

“Yes of course! As long as your laptop has a CD burner and the right software.”

“Oh… what’s a burner?”

I was baffled and paused for like 15 seconds before I answered.

As I was burning the CD for him, I showed him the wonders of Facebook and the many funny and interesting videos shared there. He doesn’t have a Facebook account, because he doesn’t know what is it all about.

“Oh, I’ve always wanted to ask…”
“Yea?”
“Who’s that lady in that picture? I’ve always seen here at a lot of places.”

Monalisa

I froze for a second.

“You… don’t know who she is?”
“Uhh… no?”
“She’s Mona Lisa!”
“Who?”
“This the famous painting by Leonardo Da Vinci! Don’t you know who Da Vinci is?”

“Uhh… who?” He was smiling sheepishly as I raised my voice.

“Da Vinci! Didn’t you read the Da Vinci Code book as it was the craze for the past few years?”
“Uhh… I think I’ve seen the movie poster before.”

I spent the next 30 minutes explaining to him who is Da Vinci, what the Mona Lisa is all about, some trivia about the difference of comic, illustration and art, and how to burn a CD.

For a moment, I was really shocked. He’s the same age as me. The computer craze generation. How can there be anyone who doesn’t know how to burn a CD at my age?

Then my conscience hit me. He is the same age as me, but we led very different life. I grew up in the city, he grew up in the country. He came to the city to learn pastry after his high school graduation, as he said, the school was all punks and he has no real good memories from it. He worked in a pastry materials distribution warehouse as a product tester, and turned to direct selling for more income.

He knows everything about spirulina and his vitamins and his cooking wares. He knows how to do facial, how to keep your face and skin good, how to live a healthy living with good food habits and good supplement intake. He knows how to talk and how to sell. He doesn’t know what is Restaurant City or FarmVille. And no, he doesn’t know how to burn a CD. Nor Mona Lisa, because he never read about her. Or anything that involves reading. His language of communication is Chinese, and that’s about it.

That’s the world of my friend. His world Now, who am I to judge him?

We all have to bear in mind, we’re all part of the luckier ones in the world. There’s probably 3/5 of the world’s population that has never touched a mouse before.

Well, on the other hand, they may have lived with mice and see them running around every day, while we squeal and shriek when we see one like every few months.

When he left that day, he thanked me for telling him who is Mona Lisa and teaching him a lot of things with that happy-go-lucky classic smile of his. I smiled back, closed the door, and smacked my head.

I shouldn’t have raised my voice in surprise. Who am I to judge him?