11 am Indonesia time, January 1, 2009. Present our boarding passes to uniformed military police supervising the entrance to an international airport in Indonesia, for first of several connecting flights back to Beijing.Of course having spent some of his childhood in Jakarta, Barack Hussein Obama is a considered something of a native son there. He's also one in Hawaii. And Kenya. And Illinois. And Kansas. And Columbia and Harvard. Everyone wants a piece!
"Where you from? Australians?" one of the policemen asks. It is the most likely guess for people who look like us in this part of the world. Amerika Syarikat, I reply - "the United States." We used to live in Malaysia, and after our struggles with Mandarin the Malaysian/Indonesian language feels practically like our native tongue.
The officer pulls himself up to attention and with a huge smile gives us a snappy military salute. "America - very good!" he said. He lowers the salute and says "Barack Obama!!" with a big thumbs up.
It's been a while...
But seriously, it kinda makes me want to go tour the globe more now that I don't have to be feel so embarrassed at being American.
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