We can benefit even from the least schooled.

This evening, I was late in reaching home from my trip to Pulau Langkawi. Due to that, I had to look for dinner in town. After dinner, my son and I were still thirsty, so we stopped at a stall selling cooling Chinese herbal drinks to have a cooling drink.

As the time was a little late for dinner, most of the customers had already gone off and so I had the opportunity to exchange conversation with him. noticing that one of the herbal drinks was Cooling Herbal Drink, I asked him whether that was the most cooling drink among the five types of drinks he was selling. His drinks were Herbal Cane, Chrysanthemum,Longan fruit,Cooling Herbal and Black Tea.

From that question I received a lot of knowledge about some of the drinks, knowledge which might not be found in books and certainly not as a drinker. He told me the most cooling drink among the five was the herbal cane drink. The thin fresh herbal cane was not just the coolest among those five drinks, being fresh cane, the drink from it will never be too cooling. He cautioned me on the drinking of herbal drinks that are too cooling.

And what could be more cooling than the fresh herbal cane drink? It is a drink derived from the same cane but that which has been dried. And where is the difference? Can we differentiate between the two? According to this 'teacher', it lies in the colour of the drink. He said that his customers used to say his herbal cane drinks is almost colourless, probably thinking his drink was diluted with too much water, therefore less concentrated. He told those customers that he understood that they must have been drinking very light reddish herbal cane drinks. Upon that, they asked how he knew they were drinking herbal cane drinks of that colour. So, he told them that the very light reddish herbal cane drink is made from dried herbal canes which, being dried, is less nutritious but very much cooling, too cooling for some people, especially the weak or pregnant ladies.

Then, he went on to explain the difference of the black tea and the cooling herbal drinks, offering us a little of both drinks to taste the difference between the two. In fact, according to him some 'black tea' are actually something else as the taste and the colour are obviously dissimilar. When he once pointed that out to the seller, the seller insisted it was black tea he was selling. He told me he let the person off without wishing to oppose what was said. After all, it is too unimportant a matter to argue about. Just let him win, What do we lose in doing so? Nothing. And that was a lot of wisdom from a simple herbal drink seller with very little schooling, certainly more wisdom than some titled politicians.

So, let us give more respect to everyone, irregardless of his/her background for wisdom is not found only among the educated and knowledgeable. And all of us may discover some unexpected interesting knowledge in somebody somewhere someday.