Nostalgia. Watching Obama and Bourdain doing beer and bun-cha in a Hanoi noodle shop, surrounded by every-day people (S8:E1 2016). Obama reminisces on a roadside restaurant in Puncak Indonesia, where he used to get fried fish over rice as a boy. Bourdain speaks of the poignancy of Americans wanting to build a wall around the country while Obama reaches out to adversaries like Gaza, Iran, and Cuba. The journalistic instincts and cinematography behind the setup is electrifying.
Bourdain: “I just wish that more Americans had passports. The extent of what you can see how other people live seems useful at worst and incredibly pleasurable and interesting at best.”
Obama: “It confirms the basic truth that people everywhere are pretty much the same. The same hopes and dreams…there are going to be moments at any given part of the world where things are terrible. But having said all that, I think things are going to work out.”
I hope so too, and may it be so.