The gaps of the generations, because of the different time periods we grew up in, translated…
A little over two months ago, I’d gone to see the anime “The Sword of the Devil”, and, out of my expectations, that my mother who’d never even READ this series of comics wanted to come with. She was quite curious, of why this comic-turned movie was so popular, and so, I can only, explain the plot of the storyline to her from before the movie started. I’m guessing, that she might, fall asleep during the movie out of boredom, but it didn’t, matter. But, out of my expectations, my mom, who’s almost seventy made it through the whole thing, and, her thoughts of the movie was that the characters are drawn, weird (perhaps, she’d gotten to the style of character in the films of Miyazaki).
In recent year, every time, there’s the newer generations of movie makers or other forms of arts that won the awards, that were welcomed, like the movies, music, the social networks in Hong Kong would have this sort of a message, “What? Never heard it! Never seen it! What the HECK is this? So-and-So (from twenty-five to thirty years ago) is, way better! These new-age work is so awful, so bad!” I’d thought, that these “trolls” are an interesting, phenomenon, if you really don’t know, and hadn’t heard of it, just google it, is there a need, to tell the whole world, that you don’t, know it? Is it something, that you need to, BRAG about? (of course, the younger generations may not understand it, or may have never heard of things from the generations before!). But this sort of a criticisms showed, the ambiguous ways of the generations in relating to each other: the older generations didn’t WANT to understand WHAT is trending now with he younger generations, the younger generations felt, that what was in in the older generations are, outdated; and, the making fun of how odd it was, became, another sort of trying to gain the world’s, attention, the underground belittled how the mainstream chased after what’s in…………causing even, a GREATER, generation gap, and conflicts.
Take me for instance, in recent years, I’d listened to mainly songs in English. And, I’m ashamed to say, that I’d, paid NO attention to the Cantonese pop music, even those local music that had won the awards, I’d, not listened. In the gathering of friends, every time they’d played the currently trending Cantonese songs, I’d needed to ask them, no, truly, inquire, who was it sung by, what’s the title. I’d still loved, the “oldies” from the millennium more but, as a residence of Hong Kong, compared to hollering on how I never heard that, I don’t understand it, I’m, a bit, ashamed of not showing enough support for the local music.
Of course, there are, tons of, popular culture in the world, you can’t possibly, know every last one of them, can’t have the time or the energies, to get to understand everything, nor can you, always be, chasing the times either; but, keeping an open mind, wouldn’t that feel more, comfortable? With the social media, hyperpolarizing the opinions, breaking out of our, comfort zones to learn new things, to be educated in the different perspectives, it’s also, quite important.
My mother is closing on seventy, doesn’t know how to use the internet television programming, recently, the T.V. started playing the anime, “Demon Slayer”, it’d become, her weekly program. I’d asked her, is it good? “it seemed to be drawn better than the movies!” and so, I’d, sat down with her to watch, and this became, our shared, weekend activity. It seems that we will both be, looking forward, to the future seasons then!
And so, there’s, that generation gap of what’s in right now, versus, ten, twenty years ago, and people from each and every generation have their trends, and, maybe, the trends of the last five years are, no longer in any more, but that still doesn’t mean, that we have to stop, being into what interests us, we can still pursue the things that are, interesting to us, something that drives us, the important thing is, to maintain that open mind.
Life, the Obstacle Course 