Archive for January 2009

President Barack Obama’s 2009 inauguration

When administrators at Temple University, where I just started my final semester of college, found out I was going to President Obama’s inauguration, they asked me to write something for them. The following piece was featured in Temple Times’ Temple Today.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — I went to the inauguration as a journalist, and while I can’t say for sure, I think if I was pursuing some other profession, I would not have gone.

It almost didn’t happen. I was first denied press credentials on the grounds that The Temple News is too irrelevant to the event. By sheer luck, I obtained credentials from a small media group, but then had them revoked because too many media outlets were already set to flood the National Mall. Amtrak ticket prices for the weekend of the inauguration were astronomical, so I turned to the Chinatown Bus. Three hours, one rest top and a Metro ride later, I made it to Washington, D.C.’s Foggy Bottom neighborhood, home of the Lincoln Memorial and Washington Monument. Continue reading »

Students head south for historic inauguration

Vendors around the National Mall sold hoodies, t-shirts, scarves and more with President Obama's face on them.

Shannon McDonald | The Temple News | Jan. 20, 2009

They were all there for the same reason on Sunday. Every color, every age, every stage of life. They waited – some more patiently than others – in a cold, empty room until someone led them outside. Then, they waited again, in a line on Arch Street.

One by one, they boarded the Chinatown bus. They sat for three hours, growing more excited and getting more anxious, before they dragged their bags onto the Sixth Street sidewalk in Washington, D.C. They all went their separate ways, but they will reunite today for a common cause.

Today at noon, Barack Obama will become the 44th president of the United States. The theme – which commemorates the 200th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln’s birth – for the 2009 inauguration is “A New Birth of Freedom,” which was chosen by the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies in consultation with the Senate Historian’s Office.

The attendance rate is expected to be the highest in the nation’s history. Continue reading »