Printed in the December 2008 Edition of Meiwen (美文), a youth magazine based in China. Original English version translated in Mandarin.

By Michael Kan

It doesn’t matter whether you’re from China or America. But if you were born in the 1990’s, all I can say is you and your kind are getting on my nerves.

Why? Because you make me feel old.

I was born in 1984 so I’m only 24. And even though there is only a six year gap between your decade and mine, that difference is just long enough to make me realize I’m not as young as I thought I was.

It’s strange that people born in the 1990s have grown up in a time where carrying iPods and cellphones around is commonplace, as if it were almost expected of them. Back during my high school days hardly any of my classmates had a cellphone, let alone ones that could take pictures or play entire rap songs as ringtones. Not only did I carry a thick CD player to school that could never fit in my pocket, but I also used cassette tapes to listen to music.

These differences and more have grown clearer to me after college. When I graduated I became an education reporter in America, where I’ve grown up. During that time I often interviewed school students for the stories I was writing. Though the students I encountered were all nice, I often left with a question lingering in my mind: “Why are you guys so weird?”

What I found most odd is how they liked things I had never heard of. In America, many teenagers craze over TV shows like “High School Musical” Since when were teenagers interested in musicals?

But the bigger question loomed over me: didn’t I use to know what was cool and what wasn’t? How did I get out of the loop?

Now I’m in China, teaching English at a University in Xi’an. And despite living in a foreign country now, I still feel a bit in the same way. Every young person here keeps talking to me about QQ and telling me to apply for one. What is QQ? And why do all my students here like an American television show called Prison Break. It’s not that popular in the U.S. Perhaps it’s just being in a different culture, but still it makes me feel out of touch, and ultimately it makes me feel old.

I’ve heard a few times my friends say that people born in the 1990’s are shallow and immature. Hardly any of them probably read a newspaper, and that most of them only care about what’s going on in their lives. That may be true. But I realize if I criticize people born in the 1990s, it only makes me feel even older, just like a bitter parent might be. Wasn’t I just as selfish and shallow when I was a teenager?

Back in July was my birthday. And on that day I remembered a saying a friend told me in America: “When you turn 24, you are now closer to the age of 30, than you are to the age of 18.”

Now when I look at people born in the 90’s, it just serves as another reminder that I’m getting older. So yes, to all you people born in the 1990’s, you annoy me. But when you get to my age, I’m sure you’ll feel the same way about people who were born in the 2000’s.