I was talking to one of the guys from work about baseball yesterday. We both agreed on the boring nature of the event and its failure to evoke the kind of boisterous reactions during a game that are even close to those generated in other sports such as soccer or basketball. I kinda commented on its lacks of fervor and interest in Asia as compared to soccer and other sports. This guy, in his usual eagerness to show off his knowledge, responded, "But baseball is a very popular sport in Japan. But then,you can't really say Japan is in Asia, can you? Because it's commerialized, advanced and capitalist...." When he detected my immediate silence and puzzled look, he concluded with : "Of course it's just my perspective."

Last month during Christmas time, some woman in my office was searching a CD to listen. I happened to be there and was flipping through her collections. When she saw me checking out Kenny G.'s, she asked me,"Oh, you know him?" I hesitated and replied,"Yeah, Of course. He is very famous." I guess she was very surprised and then she said,"Oh, I thought you don't have his CDs in your country."

It's very amusing to see the surprising look on a man's face when I told him there are just as many traffic jams in Bangkok as in say, NYC. People in China now own cars? No, dumbass, they own automobiles. For those who have no interest in world events or have never set their feet on a foreign land before, China,Vietnam or Thailand is just another dot on the map that is of no relevance to them.

I don't hate people, I hate ignorance. I don't dislike Americans, I pity them. The American education systems are now under attack for producing hundreds of thousands of students who are completely ignorant about world affairs and reluctant to find out. How many American adults these days can identify Malaysia or Laos on a map? To many school children, Malaysia is probably another state that belongs to the U.S..

Frightful, isn't it? But as one famously puts it,"There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action."