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INAUGURATION DAY COVERAGE
» Inaugural Balls: Not So Bad
» Inauguration Day Out: Watching From the Rooftops
» Inauguration Day Out: View From the Mall
» Inauguration Day Out: Close-Up at BarackStock '09
» Inauguration Day Out: A View From the Bars
» Inauguration Live: Twittering from The Mall
PHOTO GALLERIES
» Inauguration Day Out: View From the Mall
» In Song: "We Are One" Inaugural Concert
FOOD & DRINK
» Food Nation: Eateries Near Inaugurationland
» Mission Possible: Find a Lovely, Late Night Meal
» Cheers to a Change: Swear in Some Bubbly
» Satisfy Your Taste Buds: Inauguration Cupcakes
» Forget 'Freedom Fries': Yes, Oui Can
PARTY ON
» Barack Around the Clock: Take a Celebratory Tour
» Dance Party Politics: Realistic Inaugural Balls
» Late Nights: Selected Bars with Extended Inaugural Hours
» Stay-In Swearing-In: Celebrate Obama at Home
» A Little Green for Everyone: Green Inaugural Ball
» Play That Funky Music: Chopteeth and the Afrofunk Inaugural Ball
» Sang for Change: Cocoa Tea
GETTING AROUND
» Tourist Trappings: Advice for the Out-of-Towners
» Conquering the Crowds: Inauguration Day Tips
» Yes You Can!: Bike to the Inauguration
INAUGURAL FASHION
» Secret Source: Never Too Late to Look Marvelous
» Dear Manolo: Have Yourself a Ball
» Beauty Bigwig & Makeup Maven: Bobbi Brown
» Hot to Trot: Layer Up For Inauguration Day
» Formal & Function: Inaugurate a New Tux
ETC
» Presidential Purchasing: O Say Can You Buy?
» Talk About Change: Obama Radio Nation
» Jubilee: MLK, Obama and Overcoming at the Anacostia Community Museum
» An Inspired Choice: 'Inaugural Inspiration'
Dr. Andrea Bonior dives into the world of psychology.
ALMOST TWO MILLION PEOPLE — and who knows how many handwarmers — converged on the National Mall yesterday for the inauguration of Barack Obama.
Such a mass of humanity, especially with proximity to the incoming President of the United States, is bound to bring about its fair share of problems. Social psychologists know that when people are together in large crowds, they can sometimes become overly disinhibited. A combination of deindividuation (feeling less aware of your personal morals and responsibilities when swept up in a crowd) and emotional contagion (which speaks for itself!) is often to blame.
INAUGURAL BALLS ARE TERRIBLE. This gets drilled into our heads from the moment the election is called. Inaugural balls have sparse, bad food, cash bars and crappy music, all for a thirty second visit from the new president.
Well, let's put it another way. OFFICIAL inaugural balls are like that.
The attendees of unofficial balls don't have to worry about the president showing up, so no-one waits around for him. Last night, these parties abounded -- even more than usual, everyone wanted to celebrate Obama's inauguration.
The Inaugural Peace Ball took over the National Postal Museum, with a giant concert of peace-movement luminaries.
FORGIVE ANY TYPOS — my fingers are still defrosting.
Like many people, my inauguration day began before dawn — though not by choice. I live at 701 Pennsylvania Avenue, halfway between the Capitol and the White House. Since I live so close to the parade route, I had no interest in getting up in the middle of the night to stake out a spot on the Mall. But by 5:30 a.m., more than 1,000 people had already gathered outside the checkpoint at 7th and D Streets. They were chanting "O-ba-ma" and "Yes we can" — 12 stories below my bedroom. I don't know exactly how many people were down there, but it was enough to act like a pretty effective alarm clock. My fiance is an avid Obama supporter, but this did not make her happy.
Continue Reading "Inauguration Day Out: Watching From the Rooftops" »
ATTENDING BARACK OBAMA's inauguration was a study in contrasts: An uplifting glimpse at our nation's beautiful soul, followed by a stark glare at our more troubling instincts. It was a day marked by inspiration and confusion, all delivered in the space of four hours and served with a wind chill of 8 degrees.
YOU TAKE THE GOOD ...
At 11:30 a.m., I was standing in the center of a densely packed, but comfortably spaced crowd on the east end of the Washington Monument grounds. Surrounding me were people of many ethnicities, ages, backgrounds and sexual orientations. Before the ceremony at the Capitol blared through the loudspeakers positioned along the nearly 2 mile stretch of green space and memorials, the crowd was a sea of hats, scarves, gloves, coats and frosty, nervous chatter. But most seemed to take their predicament in stride.
"I'm standing on the Washington Monument grounds with, oh, about 10 zillion of my closest friends," a man in his 40s said into his cell phone.
But the chatter began to fade when the elected officials appeared on screen. Jimmy Carter was greeted with applause, Bill and Hillary Clinton with whoops and cheers. Leaders affiliated with the GOP didn't fare so well. George H.W. Bush received at first polite silence, then a chorus of "Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye" that was probably intended more for his son, outgoing President George W. Bush, who received a loud chorus of boos.
Lavished with applause were incoming President Obama, incoming Vice President Joe Biden and their families.
While the crowd seemed to recoil in unison at the strange patter between Obama and Chief Justice John Roberts" ("He called him senator?") and the hiccup in the administering of the oath of office, they sat in rapt attention as Obama, now president, addressed them.
It was in that moment that all of the day's concerns seemed to melt away. As Obama spoke of duty and sacrifice, of unity and divisions, of the racial history that we had behind us and the tasks still before us, around me were faces deep in contemplation.
Like the strains of music before it from the bows of masters like Yo-Yo Ma and Itzhak Perlman, Obama's speech reverberated in the wind, giving it a delayed cadence like Lou Gehrig's famous farewell — a flourish which only added to its historic heft.
And for the first time all day, after jostling through the crowds and numerous adjustments of my winter gear for maximum warmth, I realized the weight of what we were witnessing. How lucky we all were to be gathered under that towering monument and watching our noble national experiment progress. And how hopeful I was that this man with so many ideas and such an eloquent way of phrasing them would make good on his promise to lead our country in the right direction.
But before me and my nearly 2 million cohorts could rest, many of us first had to be led the wrong direction.
Continue Reading "Inauguration Day Out: View From the Mall" »
"WE JUST HAVE to get through this gate — that's when we'll get to the seats," said a soon-to-be-disappointed member of the crowd mashed up next to the Silver Gate on Independence Ave.
They may have been the tickets furthest from the action — and there were emphatically no seats — but they were tickets, and that put all of us ahead of anyone relegated to the back of the Mall. We clutched them, though occasionally men in uniform would ask us to wave them in the air, and we did oh-so enthusiastically. We'd all been out in the cold for more than three hours by then, and many of us had tromped through tunnels and been given wrong directions by uniformed officers, but we were still palpably excited. After all, we had tickets.
When the guards waved us through the gate — without a glance at the tickets; anyone could have walked in — we came to a stop a little west of 3rd Street. This is close enough to see the Capitol, but not close enough that anyone could discern Barack Obama from Justice John Roberts. We mostly relied on a well-placed jumbotron with slightly off-sync audio.
And at this, the dawning of a new era of civility and decency, it became clear that neither was in the air.
Continue Reading "Inauguration Day Out: Close-Up at BarackStock '09" »
THEY SAY THE bathroom-to -person ratio on the mall today was a million to one. OK, maybe not that bad, but perhaps whatever the real odds, they were too dismal for some bladders to handle. For that and a plethora of other reasons, there was a subset of tourists and locals alike that skipped the Mall and watched the 44th president be sworn in via the good old television from watering holes in the heart of D.C.'s bar (and restaurant) scene.
Express hopped all around the U St./Adams Morgan area to bring you a view from the bars.
Continue Reading "Inauguration Day Out: A View From the Bars" »
WATCHING THE INAUGURAL from someplace warm? Then chill with reports below from Express' Greg Barber, who's taking in the inaugural events with the shivering crowds on the Mall.
TUESDAY: "Top Chef" Spike Mendelsohn has beef with Obama. It's not about a stimulus package or universal healthcare initiative. The meat of his issue is something that literally fits between two bread buns, with a little mayo, mustard and ketchup.
Chef Spike's Burger Ball is a far cry from the gobs of gown galas happening Tuesday night. Wear your comfy jeans and kick back on a stool as you stuff your face with a variety of eight mini burgers, fries and milkshakes. The $99 ticket price might appear steep at first, but don't forget that it picks up the tab on your eats, and beer and wine as well. And hey, you won't be hob-knobbing in cumbersome cumberbuns or tottering in too-tall heels. Bring on the burgers, we say!
» Good Stuff Eatery, 303 Pennsylvania Ave SE; Tue., Jan. 20, 8 p.m., $99, 202-543-8222. (Capitol South)
TUESDAY: Don't want to brave the freezing weather and the crush of people on the Mall for Inauguration Day? How about watching the inauguration in a warm, dark theater?
The AFI Silver Theatre in Silver Spring will be broadcasting the ceremony live on the big screen.
Tickets are sold out, but you can wait in a standby line, and you'll probably have a better view than you'd ever get at the actual event. But will you still feel like part of history?
» AFI Silver Theatre, 8633 Colesville Road, Silver Spring; Tue., Jan. 20, doors at 10 a.m., standby line begins at 11 a.m., free; 301-495-6720. (Silver Spring)
Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images
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