Obama Impresses State Dept. Staff With His Indonesian (VIDEO)

Barack Obama put on a bilingual display today while visiting the State Department. Obama, who lived in Indonesia from 1967 to 1971, until the age of ten, broke into Indonesian after being greeted by a State Dept. staffer in the language.

ABC News has more details:

As President Obama worked the rope-line at the State Department Thursday, a State Department staffer named Charles Silver, knowing the President once lived in Indonesia, shouted out, "good afternoon" in the local language.

Obama responded back in what Silver later told ABC News was "very good" Bahasa Indonesian. The two then chatted briefly about the neighborhood Obama once lived in.

Video via MSNBC:

Comments

[Realization]

04:20 PM on 01/24/2009

Lots to like about Obama but the headline is over the top. For Pete's sake everyone, how about some perspectiv­e. Lots of the folks there speak multiple languages pretty well. Part of the job. Would be nice if more Americans spoke several languages and understood more about foreign countries. Lot to learn that's of value. This is a big country and there really isn't much call for speaking anything but English. But those who speak several languages, like lots of Chinese these days, have a real competitiv­e advantage. Greetings alone don't count.

[Roxanna]

12:49 PM on 01/24/2009

We are going from a President that was only interested in a "Cowboy Mentality" to a President who has a much more sophistica­ted world view that the United States is Not the Only Country on this Planet.

Thank God for the Change!

[marymansour]

10:31 AM on 01/24/2009

The sensation of having a President that I can be proud of is continuing to wash over me in very pleasant waves. President Obama is such an exceptiona­l man and we have lacked real leadership for so long. Just basking.

[sherbug]

09:44 AM on 01/24/2009

Wow. Just imagine an America where our President doesn't drape his stupidity in an American Flag and call it patriotic.

[Hoosierbrad]

09:43 AM on 01/24/2009

It's refreshing to know that our President is more intelligen­t and worldly than his predecesso­r, but most of us already knew that. He is going to need all of his intelligen­ce to clean up the mess this country is in after twenty-eig­ht years of Republican economics. I know he has been underestim­ated by the Repugs in Congress, but they got a taste of his intelligen­ce and persistenc­e yesterday and I think they were surprised and overwhelme­d. It is too bad the Repugs don't have anybody intellectu­als in Congress to match Obama's intelligen­ce, but they wouldn't be Repuglican­s then, would they?

[Adrienne Williams]

03:31 AM on 01/24/2009

Why is everyone so surprised? He lived there and stated he spoke the language? LOL I lived in Japan, I know some Japanese, I worked with Deaf kids, I know sign Language. It happens. BTW Michelle Obama knows ASL too, all the more why I adore her.

[eden4barack08]

01:20 PM on 01/24/2009

From what I've read, seems everybody'­s super pleased rather than surprised.

[Penelope Lim]

01:18 AM on 01/24/2009

Erm... from what I could hear, it sounded like all he said was 'thank you' and 'how are you' in Indonesian­. No more than you' d expect from an average tourist. But it's gratifying nonetheles­s that he made the effort. It's more than a lot of other Americans, including Bush, would have done.

[affidavit]

11:47 PM on 01/23/2009

We are going from a President that spoke ZERO languages to one that speaks two!!!

[Nathan704]

12:10 AM on 01/24/2009

I lol'd at this comment. haha

[rebelzz]

12:54 AM on 01/24/2009

More than 2. I think the President'­s Spanish isn't too bad.

[berryessence]

03:31 PM on 01/24/2009

Actually,

To give a little credit to Bush.... he did speak conversati­onal Spanish.

Thats' how he won the governorsh­ip in TX

[MaryKathO]

10:48 PM on 01/23/2009

Well Conejo, Mr. President DOES speak Spanish, and some French!! Cool, huh?

[Conejo]

10:26 PM on 01/23/2009

Eat your heart out George Bush. We have endured a stupid clod in the white house for eight awful years. Are we finally moving in the right direction after all this suffering?

[Conejo]

10:25 PM on 01/23/2009

At last! A president that is bilingual. Now we need a Spanish speaker as well.

[eden4barack08]

04:50 PM on 01/25/2009

President Obama speaks Spanish too. He's actually quadri-lin­gual.

[KillBillV2]

09:48 PM on 01/23/2009

*sigh*



.....why can't we have more men like him? Why can't we have more Presidents like him?


My crush on him keeps getting bigger, which is so weird, you'd think by now after 4 years of knowing about him that It would begin to fade and that I'd get bored with Obama but NOPE it keeps growing stronger..­.for some reason I feel like I could watch him every day from here on out...

[jhw22]

10:15 PM on 01/23/2009

You had me at *sigh*!!

Jennifer

[KayDGee]

09:32 PM on 01/23/2009

Urbane, sophistica­ted, erudite, GQ looks, cool... and bi-lingual­. Wow! This transition sure has been easy on the eyes and the ears.

[eden4barack08]

04:50 PM on 01/25/2009

Quadri-lin­gual actually.

[BannedInBoston]

09:24 PM on 01/23/2009

Hah! We sure fooled ya, didn't we neocons? (And here you were worried that his Hawaiian birth certificat­e was phony!)

[BenderBot]

01:03 AM on 01/27/2009

A lot of uninformed neocons still believe that supreme court will invalidate President Obama's birth certificat­e and hand the presidency to old man McCain. They are praying and waiting for that to happen.

[BenderBot]

09:00 PM on 01/23/2009

Can someone please pinch me! Is this for real? After 8 years of insanity and incompeten­cy, I am now proud of my president!