pride in change

Where were you when? This is the question that gets asked when you hit those crossroads of history that motivate the world to tune in. I was in residence at University huddled around the common lounge television when news of Diana's death came in. I was in drama class in highschool on my birthday when OJ Simpson's verdict came in. I was in Mumbai answering the phone at the house of my friend who was the acting Canadian Consul General when the news of the 2004 tsunami in South East Asia came to us from the emergency contact of the Canadian government.

But this world event was different. This was one of earned respect. After 44 terms, the United states of America swore in Barack Hussein Obama, the first man of colour to be sworn into office. After years of oppression, and fighting for justice, this change is not slight. The man is incredible. But however huge the fact that USA has become a shade more inclusive, it also must be pointed out that Obama cannot be defined by his skin colour alone. His talent to move people, to speak words of wisdom and to engage people is unlike anything I've witnessed before. His speech today was no different. And there were thousands who were watching. Some got in their cars and drove down to be in the middle of the crowd. I decided to go it alone, and was in my living room in downtown Toronto, with the TV tuned into CBC News and my computer logged into CNN live's browser and my facebook page lined up as well. Facebook and CNN had teamed up to create an application where you as a viewer could watch and comment via your status updates in real time. You could tune into your friends' comments only or the everyone feed. Either one was amazing to watch. People were commenting on passages in the speech to Aretha Franklin's oversized grey hat to the uplifting music being played to the poor poet whose words followed the inspiring speech from the new president.

When Starbucks ran an online ad following the ceremony announcing free coffee, it was like the facebook community on cnn.live were throwing eggs at their monitors.

As a Canadian, I was also tuned into the online video feed of CBC.ca as well as the TV in my living room but there were no applications that encourages discourse for this monumental occasion, so I quickly tuned onto my other tab that yielded the cnn/facebook feed. I even logged into twitter to see if what people around the world were saying there.

I can't wait to tune in later on today for the coverage of the balls. And beyond that, I can't wait to see if Mr. Obama takes the time to use his immense power to get people to pay attention to force change in war-torn and starving countries. Change is often hard to force, but I have every faith that his intentions are good. We need a neighbour to the south who is progressive!