Where Were You When Obama Became President?

How many millions of people were watching CNN, MTV, and whatever other media (BBC, NPR, etc) from how many hundreds of places to see the inauguration? I updated my facebook status on my phone as one friend pondered whether Obama liked porcupines and another studiously avoided CNN, and my department sent out an email having successfully set up a CNN broadcast in our building.

I, however, was nowhere near South Hall – and instead enjoying pork and chips in at the Grand Holiday Inn in Mbarara, Uganda, the trading town in Western Uganda where I am based for the next year for my dissertation fieldwork. It’s an urban center – not quite the locus for most of the private health clinics where I’ll be working, but the location of Mbarara University of Science and Technology, where I’ll be teaching, and sort of the center of gravity for the private clinics – they all come here to restock their medical supplies.

On the inauguration – expecations here run from high to indifferent. The newspapers all feature Obama’s picture on the front page, both yesterday and today. The radio programs have “Obama” speaking as a guest, while people call in to discuss Bush’s legacy as the president who gave the most aid to Africa. People have high hopes – but simultaneously know not to have high expectations of the president of a country with an economy currently in shambles. Yet just Monday night I was just approached by a hotel manager wanting me to help him get to the USA so he could “raise so much capital for his business.” His plan? To work hard in the hotel industry and save money.

Most people I spoke to didn’t seem to be planning to watch the inauguration – yet when one of my coworkers was checking in to her hotel at about 3pm (4am Pacific, T-4 hours), the reception was playing CNN, which had already started the countdown to the inauguration. (It transpired later that whatever the reception played – the entire hotel had to watch, since they controlled the cable access for the entire building!!)

Later, I discovered that my place didn’t have a tv, so when the time came, I went back to my coworker’s hotel room and joined her to watch the festivities. The power was out, so there was a super-loud generator running just outside her room competing with the volume of the (heh) 13 in tv. The walls of the room were an odd shade of lime green. She called many of her friends and family to see if they were watching too – “how can you be watching cartoons when history is happening?” I found it strange that we could be off work and watching – while many of my friends had to be at work or class and couldn’t get away to see it. Yet at the same time, part of the (ahem) cnn experience was also seeing people all around the US watching the inauguration on giant screens everywhere else. It’s crazy to be a part of such a shared experience.

So. Where were you when Obama became president?