Election Time!

"This is our chance to answer that call. This is our moment. This is our time..." -Barack Obama's victory speech.

Now, I know that I have said before that Niagara was something I will never forget.... but last night has to be right up there or maybe even above Niagara.

It was pandemonium in DC last night. I have never seen or felt anything like it. I woke up and went to volunteer at Rock the Vote. Rock the Vote is a non-profit, non-partisan group that focuses on getting youth voters to get out to the polls. My friend Sarah does her internship there so I gave my day to calling people to make sure they headed out to the polls. Surprisingly many people were excited that I called and would actually talk about their volunteer work they were doing to get people to vote. Everyone was just to energized for what was happening.

At night me and 5 Swedish girls went out to Union Pub to go see the poll numbers start coming in. It was located right down town by Union Station and it was absolutely packed. It was defiantly an Obama bar but, hey, that was what I was looking for. Every time a new state would come in people to cheer and drink and hug. And, at 11:00, the place almost blew up people went so crazy! People we crying, screaming, jumping up and down. It was great to see the Swedes get so worked up over the election. Like my friend Lina said "This is not just about the US. People in Sweden are going crazy over this. This moment affects all of us." It really did feel like I needed to take in every moment because this was something I was going to tell my grandchildren some day. And can we just talk about that speech Obama gave?!? I have never been so moved by a speaker before. I'm not going to lie, I had tears in my eyes... but so did everyone else in the pub.

The girls and I proceeded to walk downtown to get a taxi because there were so many people around that we could not flag one down where we were. We ended up in China town and it was insanity! There were people dancing in the streets, banging on cars, chanting "Yes we Can!" and "Obama!". It was like something out of a movie. All the cars were honking and people were standing out of sun roofs just yelling about change and how this is out time. The atmosphere was just electric. This night made my trip to DC worth it. There was no better place to be... well maybe except Chicago.

I ended up going to sleep around 3 because it took us an hour and a half to flag down a taxi.