Dance, drama, hope…
Pulkit Vasudha , TNN
Wrapped in blankets, in Washington DC, almost two million people braved -13 degree celsius to be a part of a historic presidential inauguration.
In homes across the nation, people woke up as early as 4 am to catch the action live on TV. At breakfast meetings, viewing parties, and coffee houses, people pulled their chairs closer to the television sets, and turned up the volume to hear Barack Hussein Obama’s speech above the clapping and cheering. Schools in poor districts got cable connections just so their students could watch the first African-American preident of the United States take oath.
For most Americans, there was just an overwhelming sense of relief, for, this signalled the end of an era of mismanaged political administration. Obama has taken the hippies’ word, ‘hope’, and made it a national mantra. If nothing else, it has proven to be a very powerful marketing strategy for the man who made history by being sworn in on Capitol Hill.
Most people are full of this new energy – there’s HOPE radiating from DC, sunnying every porch and warming every heart. Anastasia Hellinsky, a Russian immigrant to California, developed a new belief in the nation and its people when she worked for the Obama campaign. “This was the presidential speech I have been waiting for in the 14 years of my American existence. I had been telling my friends, if McCain was elected, I’d move to Sweden,” says this 22-year-old graduate of San Diego State University.
An Indian photographer and Stanford alumnus, who became a US citizen last week, had a practical view of the situation. “Let’s give the man four years to accomplish what he must. People do want change. They compare him to Martin Luther King, but King was an anti-imperialist. If Obama can change the US modus operandi of arm-twisting other countries to get its way, it’d be a real change.” Steve Mangold, president of a communications company in the Bay Area, says, “America will now have a political philosophy. Also, Obama brings with him a new spirit; hopefully, he also has a plan for a rational home and foreign policy.”
As I write, thousands of people are at Inauguaration parties, raising a toast to the newly elected President Barack Obama and hoping for a new era of thoughful, progressive politics. Cheers to the man who has brought so much hope during, and despite, the recession.
Pulkit Vasudha (An Indian executive staying in California)
Source: Times of India