Obamamania!

To celebrate the occasion of the election, I went to a bar with a friend after our Arabic class on Tuesday night (midday in the states, I’m 7 hours ahead), and stayed up late monitoring some of the early results.

We woke up early and caught a cab at 5:45 AM to a party thrown by the U.S. Embassy at the Hard Rock Café. We got there about 10 minutes before CNN called the election for Obama, so it was exciting to be awake to see that. I ate a quick breakfast and stayed a while to watch coverage and appreciate the moment. Around 8:30 I walked up along the Nile and caught the bus to work, but I did not get very much done at work – I was too excited and exhausted to do much of anything, so I followed the election results for most of the states (especially for Jim Himes and Al Franken!).

I have been traveling outside the U.S. for a decent part of the last 3 years, and Wednesday – for the first time – I felt proud to respond truthfully when people on the street asked me if I was American. It is truly incredible how Bush completely destroyed our international reputation, but now we know that “America's beacon still burns as bright – tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from our the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope.” - Barack Obama