Fired Up!

I am so proud of our fair city of St. Louis. I was at the Obama rally today and I knew it was a special place to be. I had heard the reports that about 100,000 people gathered at the Arch grounds to hear Barack Obama speak. But, tonight was the first time that I saw a picture. Here is a picture from my vantage point.


And, earlier this evening I was at a birthday party for a friend of my parents. One of the Thai couples at the party, Dr. S. and Dr. S., were so excited that I went to the rally and wanted to hear all about it. This was a special moment for me. Most of my parents' friends are Republicans, mostly for financial reasons. They came to this country with very little and were able to achieve a lot and make a very healthy living. Anyway, this couple, who I have known for over 20 years, really surprised me. They completely understand why Barack Obama is our best hope for a better future for America and the world. They both said that they are voting for Barack Obama, not for themselves, but for their children and grandchildren. I was so happy to hear them express this message. I can only hope that they will convince the rest of the Thai community too.

Check out more photos at The Page by Mark Halperin of Time Magazine. Halperin also has the full text of Senator Obama's speech on his site.

We can change the world.

Barack Obama made his last stop of Super Saturday in St. Louis, where 20,000 people greeted him. I was one of them. My friends, both named Sarah, and I had dinner and headed out to the Edward Jones Dome for the 9:00 p.m. rally. We drove past the drunken revelers from the Soulard Mardi Gras celebration. I thought to myself, these people are going to miss out on history here tonight.

After finding a free parking spot and hiking to the Dome, we awaited the arrival of the Senator. I thought that maybe he would be late because he was all of over the country today. I watched CNN for a good portion of the day and saw bits of Obama's speeches in Boise on Saturday morning and in Minneapolis in the early afternoon. The man must be exhausted. But, when he arrived at 9:15, he was in remarkably good spirits. I would like to think he was energized by our large crowd. I really didn't know there were 20,000 people there until Senator Claire McCaskill said so. And, after checking the Obama website, I found out that there were 20,000 in Minneapolis and 15,000 in Boise. So, Barack Obama spoke to 55,000 people today. That's incredible!

The speech was fantastic. I've seen him on TV and I've seen the acceptance speeches, but seeing and hearing Obama live is pretty freaking cool. I was also excited because my friends were there with me, and they were excited too. Sarah R. admitted that she usually doesn't usually keep up with politics, because she is fed up with all of the crap out there. I hope tonight showed her that there is a positive movement going on in the Obama camp. And, with our help, I really think that Barack Obama can lead our country to a better and happier existence.

We really can change the world.

Day 1 - St. Louis, Missouri to Barcelona, Spain

Sorry. I got a little sidetracked last week and didn't post a blog as promised. Many thanks to Julie Moyer for the nudge. Here it goes.

First, I'll provide a little background about this trip. Jenna, one of my closest friends from college, convinced me to go on this Mediterranean cruise with her and her family. Jenna's grandparents celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary in 2007. They are the sweetest people and I have known them for almost 12 years. Jeez, time does fly. I, in turn, convinced my friend Heather to take the trek. Heather and I were the only St. Louis people in our group. The other 18 are were from Louisville, Kentucky.

Heather and I decided to get to Barcelona a day before the cruise, so that we could explore the city. Our itinerary was St. Louis to Miami, Miami to Madrid, and Madrid to Barcelona. So, on October 25, our day started very early -- 4:30 a.m. Our flight to Miami was at 6:50 a.m. Looking back, I think I would have paid extra money in order to not have so many stops. But, I was the one who made the reservations, so oh, well. The flight from St. Louis to Miami was uneventful. Since we got to Miami so early, we had a really long lay over -- seven hours. I think we spent an hour of that layover trying to get to our gate. This was my first visit to Miami International, and I was not very impressed with the layout of the airport. We killed time listening to music, reading, snacking, and blowing up inflatable travel pillows. The flight from Miami to Madrid was also uneventful. The food on the flight was surprisingly decent. This is only the third time that I have flown overseas, so I don't have a lot of experience with airline food.

The Madrid airport is an architectural wonder. It's just another example of how the U.S. is behind the times in terms of design and architecture. This was just the first of many architectural and design wonders we saw on this trip. Originally, I thought the airport was designed by Santiago Calatrava. The style is very similar to the art museum he recently designed in Milwaukee, WI. However, I just looked up the architect for the airport and it was designed by Richard Rogers firm, out of London. In any case, the airport is truly fantastic in terms of design, but I will admit that the layout of the gates and the signage is not so hot. We had less than two hours until our flight to Barcelona and it took a little over an hour to figure out where our gate was located. Luckily, there were several people from our Miami flight who were also going to Barcelona, so we just followed the big group.

The flight from Madrid to Barcelona was barely 45 minutes. And, here is the first strange occurrence on our trip. For some odd reason our plane did not disembark at the gate. Heather and I were seated at the back of the plane, when we noticed that the back of the plane was open. Our Iberia flight was in an old MD-83 plane, where you can descent a flight of steps from the back of the plane. We were loaded up into two buses and taken to the baggage terminal. I will admit that I was pretty anxious about whether or not our bags would make it through all of the connections. Both Heather and I purposely packed our carry-on bags to include a few days worth of clothing, just in case our luggage was lost. Luckily, both of our bags made it to Barcelona unharmed.

Technically, this is the beginning of day two of the big trip. So, I will leave you at this point. Come back in a few days and we'll dive into the meaty part of Ann's Mediterranean vacation.

Later,
at