Here’s To Technology Although My Phone Is a Nokia From 2006

Although I may seem like a Luddite with my Nokia and my stubborn insistence of having tangible, physical CDs and DVDs, I actually love technology. The whole internet thing; reaching people all over the world and be screamed at by them for not being a 70s radical – great! When I first started teaching Cantonese back in the early 90s I remember drawing the course material by hand and then going to Central to have it copied in a copy shop by a professional copier. Wild times!

I still draw the course by hand but now I scan it, edit it in Paint for Mac and print it out on a super, Canon colour printer that prints photos so beautifully they are like the printed photos of yore. The ones, remember, that you had to have printed in a photoshop that wasn’t in your house? From a film in a canister?

And how about all the people with similar interests that you can meet on Facebook while being abused by people who disagree with you politically? And how about Skype?!? I remember when it was too expensive to call someone who lived in a different part of the country, let alone the world!

This morning I had a skype lesson with a guy in the USA, so it was night for him. He had just had a baby, seven days old today, who I could hear and see thanks to the wonderful invention that is Skype. Thank you, smart and wonderful people who have made all this possible.

So now you can live anywhere in the world and still have ‘live’ Cantonese lessons on skype! You’ll thank yourself for it later.

電腦 (din lou – electric brain/computer)
美國 (Mei Gok – Beautiful Country/USA)
影印機 (yeng yan gei – copy machine)