Well yesterday Lauren and myself along with 2 friends (Jen, a friend of Lauren's from MSB, and Noel, a friend of Lauren's from undergrad at GW) headed over to the Mall to witness history. We left around 7am (which we knew would be late) and headed to Metro. We fortunately live real close to the Crystal City Metro stop which is on both the Blue and Yellow lines, and minutes after we got to the station we were on the Yellow Line bound for L'Enfant station. The ride was pleasantly empty (not being sarcastic, really it was rather empty and that surprised us), but when we exited the train at L'Enfant... well out journey began...
It took us nearly an hour just to exit the station and then we got a few moments of space (since right at the station exit all tourist had to stop and figure out where they were going... being that my friend Edd and I like to head to the Mall on weekends to fly kites, I knew exactly the route we should take to the Mall (thanks Edd). So while everyone milled trying to figure out their directions, off we went... straight into more traffic. The entrance to the Mall near us was closed and the first open entrance was at 14th... so we knew we were starting late and now we were sure that we'd be decently far back, but we knew we wanted to be there and we weren't turning back....
So as we joined the crowd and went with the flow. That said... the crowd was amazing in both size and more importantly, patience. I've never been so amazed with the population of this country than I was in the crowd... no pushing, no mean people, just a common frustration and a willingness to be patient and to be helpful. At some point we all came across a baracade (which we all know meant we should go around...) the crowd calmly allowed those who couldn't make it over the baracade to go sideways around the baracade and those of us who could go over... and this is one memory myself and Noel will probably always remember about that day... Jen quickly was over the baracade, Lauren made it over with minor help by me, and while I was helping Lauren, a young man (10-14 years of age) noticed Noel struggling (we were all overly dressed in boots and coats which made it hard to move in general) to make it over the baracade and without a second thought, the young man simply reached out and gave Noel a hand.
So back to flowing with the crowd... well again like I said we already expected and were joking that we'd be sitting on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, so when we hit a 'road-block' at 14th... we knew it may be worse. That said... as we were waiting for crowd control to guide us across (they were using what looked to be a truck to prevent certaing sides of pedestrian traffic from crossing plus helping emergency vehicles to get across), some one around us decided to simply enter the parking lot of the Ag building and off we went... straight to the Mall.... wow were we happy, right where Noel and I hoped we'd be... between the Capitol and the Washington Monument and then even closer that we'd hoped and with a great view of the jumbotron.
And back to the amazingness of the crowd... now that we were situated... we also found ourselves infront of the area reserved for the disabled and elderly. The National Park Service also arranged for volunteers to be stationed to help. One responsibility make sure that they had a view of the jumbotron... the amazingness of the crowd, anytime the volunteers had to ask someone to move that was blocking the view of the jumbotron, they simply thanked the volunteer and moved on... it was so nice to see that everyone was so nice and friendly and willing to do what they could to make sure everybody had a positive time.
now for some photos... (if the below embedded object doesn't work try the following link:
http://flickr.com/photos/nickc_321/sets/72157612755964163/)
and with special thanks to EWeb Voice Recorder which allowed me to record President Obama's First Inaugural Address. You can download my recording at: http://www.box.net/shared/76690lx2y8. (Wikipedia's transcript: link)
Well a new President is in office...
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