Two times when I have have walked home from my college, I have seen an old Asian man on a bike. “An old Asian man on a bike? What’s so special about that”, you might ask. Well, If you live in Asia, I guess you see old Asian men on bikes every day. But that is not the point.Two times when I have have walked home from my college, I have seen an old Asian man on a bike. “An old Asian man on a bike? What’s so special about that”, you might ask. Well, If you live in Asia, I guess you see old Asian men on bikes every day. But that is not the point.

What I noticed was how fast he was biking - or rather how slow. I have never seen anyone drive a bike that slow without falling over and hitting the pavement or a car. I could easily have walked besides him on his journey to his (to me unknown) destination. But I decided not to in case he was on a twenty miles ride or something like that. The thing was that he looked so exteremly satisfied and happy with life as the passed me - it seemed like he didn’t have a single worry in life.

I hope I can ride my bike real slow and be happy when I get old.

Actually, it seems to me like no Asian old folks have worries. When you see TV broadcasts from Asia, do you ever see an unhappy old person. No, you don’t. They all get up at 4 in the morning and get together in the park where they do strange gymnastic exercises for several hours. And then they play chess for the rest of the day. And they all look very satisfied.

I’m going to move to Asia when I get old.

Imagine what the world would be like if we were all old folks from Asia. No wars, no worries, no oil spills, no hard feelings and no fights. The world would have been a marvelous place! The only problem is that it would not have lasted very long, because everyone were in the park (which by the way would be very crowded) doing strange gymnastic exercises or playing chess and no one made clothes or food or those small hand held computers we all want. We would probably start eating each other after a week or so.

But let us not forget that all these happy looking old Asian people might just mess around with our minds. The thing is that most of the old Asians you see on TV broadcasts today are old enough to remember Mao and the communism, and most of them are probably old school communists. Maybe they just act happy and satisfied to make us believe that communism is a good thing? That Mao was a real genius killing all them birds. Maybe they are all commies who try to take over the world?

Or maybe they are all stone on Prozac?