Obama Abroad

It's strange to me that foreign countries are pasting our president's picture on our flag, not to burn, but to wave around as though he were the Beatles. But of course that's exactly what I hoped for when I voted for him.


Six months into his presidency I give him mixed reviews. He's more cautious and less bold than I think the times call for, and I'm getting impatient on the gay stuff. But everything he's done and said abroad has been pretty much exactly what I wanted.

As a side note -- but maybe not too much to the side -- practically everyone I know is either currently abroad or is planning a trip abroad. At this moment I know someone visiting England, someone visiting Sweden, someone visiting France, and two unrelated people visiting Spain. Other upcoming trips include Scotland, Vietnam, and Canada. Even little old insular me is starting to get the itch for foreign travel.

For people my age, the entirety of our adult lives thus far was spent under the Bush Administration, during which, if we went anywhere, we said we were from Canada. Now I think we've got our dignity back, and it's making us want to explore.