Friday, January 27, 2017

A Better Burger King?

At the Shanghai Airport Burger King here, where we are sitting, there is a self-serve cooler, with a shiny glass door, full of 12oz cans of Budweiser beer.  What other kind of beer would you serve at an American fast food restaurant?  Each can is 30RMB or about 5.00 U.S. dollars!

Selfie of me with Budwieser fridge under Home of the Whopper sign in the background.
Look under the word Whopper

Sometimes I've heard myself say that China can't quite get certain American things, like food, quite right, but it's OK because America doesn't get Chinese things quite right either.  But sometimes, more than you might think, and more than I blog about in this blog, China gets a few American things better than America does.  Why don't they serve beer at Burger King in America? 

Imagine that you grew up in China and, once you were an adult, loved spoiling yourself occasionally with a bug juicy Whopper and you always washed it down with a can of Budweiser while trying to imagine how much better this authentic combination might taste if you were in America made by American burger experts.  Like eating Sushi in Tokyo!

Then imagine you go to America, the birthplace of the Whopper, the land of burgers and beef, where we eat burgers every day... and the Burger King barista says "No we don't serve beer here." as if it was a ridiculous idea! 

Becky, my lovely wife, just looked up from her computer and asked me if I had gotten a beer yet.  No not yet, but now I better do it, before the taste of the burger I already ate disappears entirely.  I can't blog about it and not drink it right?  Also, fresh off the plane from America, waiting for my next flight, the 30RMB price tag doesn't really mean much to me, I don't have the foreign exchange rates wired back into my brain yet, 30RMB isn't attached to a value yet.  And besides how many extra authentic American experiences can I get in China?  It'll be worth it.

P.S. It was everything I imagined it would be.

No comments: