England or America

During our last night in Brisbane, Julia and I were enjoying our dessert of yogurt and fruit when Julia noticed a man’s tattoo. He was standing on the porch drinking a beer when we spotted a tattoo on his ankle that said “America” in Chinese. If you’re wondering it sounds like “Mei Guo” and is written like this 美國.

Julia was very interested in the tattoo and wanted to ask them man why he had decided to tattoo “America” in Chinese on his ankle and after much discussion about how to most politely ask the man, we decided that there really wasn’t a good way to ask. Anyways, I went to bring our dishes downstairs while Julia went to ask the man about America and moments later, Julia came into the room and said, "I asked him what his tattoo said instead of why he had America on his ankle!” That wasn’t even the best part though, because the man said that his tattoo said “England”, which I thought was hysterical because it actually says America.

According to Julia he had an English accent too. Regardless, we never found out why the man had America tattooed on his ankle IN CHINESE and the man never found out that it was in fact America on his ankle and not England. I almost wanted to go back upstairs to tell him that it was America and not England but I didn’t want to anger him. I dunno, if I paid to get something permanently put on my body and it wasn’t what I wanted, I’d be pretty mad. But hey, I also wouldn’t get something in a language that wasn’t one I knew. Anyways, rock on, America!