On Saturday morning, after walking a three mile charity walk to raise money for Juvenile Diabetes research, we drove downtown to see what was happening with the Barack Obama visit to Greensboro. Since the debates were on Friday, I was interested in hearing Obama’s response to his performance. Plus, it is always cool to see a famous politician up close, or at least in person.
We parked the car in that always unused parking lot between Bellemeade and Friendly and headed up towards Elm Street. There were people walking the streets, but not many. I thought for sure that we would have no trouble getting into the Washington Street Depot to see Obama and Biden. As we strolled casually through the alley between the Marriott parking lot and the hotel, you could see the crowd of people lining up down Elm Street. We started to pick up our pace, the energy of the crowd drawing us towards them. As we emerged from the mouth of the alley, we were greeted with an amazing sight. For as far as you could see in both directions, up and down Elm Street, there were thousands of people lined up. I guessed the line was at least 10 blocks long, but I couldn’t see the either end from where we were standing.
“What do you want to do?” I asked Dan.
“Let’s walk.”
We started to walk down the street towards, what looked like the end of the line. Truthfully, we hadn’t even planned on actually trying to see Obama and Biden. We had just come to see what was happening downtown. As I looked down the sidewalks full of people, I knew there was no way we were going to see anything.
We kept walking.
We had only been walking a minute or two when a wave of motion caught our eyes. We saw, about a block down from us, the streets began to fill with people. The crowd swarmed off of the sidewalk into the street, moving briskly towards us. The cars on Elm Street were engulfed by people and were unable to move. Dan, Bronwen and I stepped off the side walk and got swept into the mass of people pushing forward. The wave stretched before and behind us, the space between people shrinking as we tried to squeeze ourselves into the finite space between buildings. There was no way out of it. We were moving quickly. I got nervous about Bronwen in the stroller so Dan put her on his shoulders and we kept moving. It took us about forty minutes to move from Bellemeade to Washington Street; it didn’t seem too long as the mass of people kept moving forward all the time. Finally, we could see the Depot, and as we turned onto Washington Street, I freaked out. There were about 7,000 people in front of us, and 10,000 people behind us, and metal retaining gates in either side of us. I wanted out, and I realized there was no where to go.
We staked our claim on enough space for two adults, along side of the metal gate and waited for the show to begin. I couldn’t see anything but the back of peoples’ heads in front of me, and peoples’ faces behind me. The only way out of the crowd was to look at the sky. The sky was gray and it was drizzling.
Obama spoke for about 30 minutes. He was articulate and funny and I liked what he had to say. But my favorite parts were when he got 18,000 people to cheer, or laugh, or groan together.
We parked the car in that always unused parking lot between Bellemeade and Friendly and headed up towards Elm Street. There were people walking the streets, but not many. I thought for sure that we would have no trouble getting into the Washington Street Depot to see Obama and Biden. As we strolled casually through the alley between the Marriott parking lot and the hotel, you could see the crowd of people lining up down Elm Street. We started to pick up our pace, the energy of the crowd drawing us towards them. As we emerged from the mouth of the alley, we were greeted with an amazing sight. For as far as you could see in both directions, up and down Elm Street, there were thousands of people lined up. I guessed the line was at least 10 blocks long, but I couldn’t see the either end from where we were standing.
“What do you want to do?” I asked Dan.
“Let’s walk.”
We started to walk down the street towards, what looked like the end of the line. Truthfully, we hadn’t even planned on actually trying to see Obama and Biden. We had just come to see what was happening downtown. As I looked down the sidewalks full of people, I knew there was no way we were going to see anything.
We kept walking.
We had only been walking a minute or two when a wave of motion caught our eyes. We saw, about a block down from us, the streets began to fill with people. The crowd swarmed off of the sidewalk into the street, moving briskly towards us. The cars on Elm Street were engulfed by people and were unable to move. Dan, Bronwen and I stepped off the side walk and got swept into the mass of people pushing forward. The wave stretched before and behind us, the space between people shrinking as we tried to squeeze ourselves into the finite space between buildings. There was no way out of it. We were moving quickly. I got nervous about Bronwen in the stroller so Dan put her on his shoulders and we kept moving. It took us about forty minutes to move from Bellemeade to Washington Street; it didn’t seem too long as the mass of people kept moving forward all the time. Finally, we could see the Depot, and as we turned onto Washington Street, I freaked out. There were about 7,000 people in front of us, and 10,000 people behind us, and metal retaining gates in either side of us. I wanted out, and I realized there was no where to go.
We staked our claim on enough space for two adults, along side of the metal gate and waited for the show to begin. I couldn’t see anything but the back of peoples’ heads in front of me, and peoples’ faces behind me. The only way out of the crowd was to look at the sky. The sky was gray and it was drizzling.
Obama spoke for about 30 minutes. He was articulate and funny and I liked what he had to say. But my favorite parts were when he got 18,000 people to cheer, or laugh, or groan together.
3 comments:
It was surely the most bizarre and memorable event I've ever been unexpectedly caught up in! The best thing was, although there were 18,000 people all trying to move in the same direction, no-one was being mean or selfish about it. everyone seemed really friendly, helpful and upbeat. It was great!
The News & Record has photos of the event, so you can see the size of the crowd.
Thank you so much for the picture links. There is nothing much more old-tyme patriotic than the old whistle stop stumping. I love that late September Greensboro in the backgrounds.
And Sudokugirl: "The only way out of the crowd was to look at the sky." Nice work.
Thanks Mr C. I will have to give credit for that line to my mom. I remembered her telling me about the time that my dad and her went to Watkins Glen. That concert was once listed in the Guiness Book of World Records as the "largest audience at a pop festival." There were 600,000 people attending. She told me that the only way to get away from the people "was to look at the sky." It stuck with me, and when I was feeling clausterphobic on Saturday, I kept looking at the sky and taking deep breaths. It really worked.
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