President Obama interacting with students at St Xavier's College Mumbai on Nov 7. -(Pic Mohammed Jaffer-SnapsIndia)
NEW YORK: President Barack Obama, who has returned from a 10-day trip through four Asian countries starting out with India, going on to Indonesia, participating in the G-20 Summit in South Korea and concluding with the APEC meet in Japan, came away with the strongest impressions, it would seem, from India.
It may be that at the town hall meet at St. Xavier’s College in Mumbai President Obama faced some very tough questions from college students, but it was the school kids he met earlier that day who seemed to have impressed him, of course with good reason.
On his way back home, responding to a reporter’s query on board Air Force One on Nov 15, on what his takeaway/highlight was from the entire trip President Obama said all of Asia was eager for American engagement and leadership. “We saw that in India; we saw it in Indonesia; we saw it during the G20 and we saw it during APEC,” he said.
But what struck him most was that such an expectation was not just from leaders. “I was struck when I was at the first school that we went to in Mumbai, and those young kids who were talking about the environment and green technology. On the way down, I said, “Well, what are you guys’ plans?”
“Well, we’re of course going to go to college.” I said, “Where are you going to go?” “Well, America, of course.”
The President said despite the tough couple of years, and cynicism back home, all over Asia – leaders and people – think of America as still central. “And they want us there,” he said.
His second strong impression of the trip, President Obama said, was that Asians are truly moving. “Korea, China, India, the entire Southeast Asian region – Japan – all of them recognize how competitive things are and that they are thinking each and every day about how to educate their workforce, rebuild their infrastructure, enter into new markets. And we should feel confident about our ability to compete, but we are going to have to step up our game.”
Back in India, the incident where White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs had an altercation with Indian security officials over the number of White House media representatives that should be allowed for the Obama-Singh bilateral meeting in New Delhi – Gibbs is supposed to have actually stuck his foot in the door so it would not be closed before all of “his White House Eight” were allowed in for the photo-op – has become infamous, if not viral on mainstream American television.
When a reporter asked tongue-in-cheek, whether Gibbs was in line for a Presidential Medal of Freedom for taking on the Indians to get reporters in, President Obama, amidst laughter, said, “I will say that his foot is still bruised. But it was all for a good cause.”
India Post News Service
