They named it that like 3 months ago because the people who owned it were banking that Obama was going to win and that that would be a cool name for a place that sells dan bing (see below). When Obama won I was at school, and all the teachers kept coming into my office and congratulating me like I had done something/won something. But i felt what they were saying, because there's really a vibe here of being impressed with America again.
Surprisingly, one of the things they were really interested in is the concept of absentee ballots, which don't exist in Taiwan. Even soldiers stationed abroad can't vote without coming back to Taiwan. They were like, "really?! you can just mail a letter?! How do they know it's really you?"
And ironically, "Obama" sounds a lot like the Chinese word, "banma," which means zebra. A zebra, of course, is half-black and half-white.
I also led all of my classes for that day with the chant, "Hello Obama! Goodbye Bush!" because we were learning the Beatles song "Hello Goodbye." I highly encourage you to ellicit chants of "Hello Obama!" from any Taiwanese schoolchildren you meet. They really love it.
Taiwanese dan bing, good breakfast for cheap:
2 comments:
hey brett! go obama!!!
lovin' your blog. so jealous you actually got to set foot on turtle island (the day we went, it was vomiting all the way and to choppy to get off the frcikin' boat). taiwan is the bomb, i miss it like my left arm lost in the war, man.
you're teachin' your kids beatles' songs? damn man, you rock. all time faves.
enjoy enjoy enjoy because before you know it, it'll be over.
Rawk!
Miin
heyy sorry it took so long for me to finally get back to your blog. thanks for the shout out! and i haven't seen any eponymous obama meals :( hopefully that will change when i get to chi on wed!! thank god for breaks. that's cool that they are so into obama all the way out there. still sounds like you're havin an awesome time. and i'm very impressed that you're keeping your blog up.
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