Update: Enjoy the trip in the diary here; but folks, we need help in PA. If you can come here and canvas, the campaign will likely find you a place to stay. Call from home on the phones. Pray, if you are into praying. Order a pizza for a campaign office (we really need food, see comments for how send food to the West Philly field office). We've got the job of all jobs here.
So yesterday I woke up and had no idea I would be spending the evening with Barack Obama at a volunteer training with 1500 other Obama activists.
Early in the morning, my housemate was bragging about being invited to a training with Barack Obama. She made it sound like this exclusive invite-only, hand picked kind of thing. I was beside myself with jealousy; although I tried to hide it. I have been volunteering with the campaign much more than my housemate. So after I calmed down a little; I called the office and asked about getting a ticket. The staffer said "sure, come to the office and get one." OMG: I'm going to see Barack, I was beside myself with excitment; so much so I called for Obama for 2 hours at the West Philly office when I went to get my ticket.
This was not a public rally; it was billed as a training for volunteers.
The event was at the Philadelphia Convention Center in Center City. It's huge; although we were just using a small part of it.
Doors opened at 5, Here is the line that was up around 5 pm. My housemate got there later and she said it took 2 hours to get through the line and through security.
Here was a line:
And this was the final climb to "who knows what comes next." At least we were going up in the world.
I took a picture of the the secruity lines and the secret service came up to me right away and made me delete the picture of the lines. Makes sense, I guess.
Inside, this is about 70% of the place. The people were amazing; everyone just seems so beautiful. I can't really explain.
We had over an hour of local activist talk about the campaign: how it's organized within Philly, the history of it, what the plan is.
update: from Bronxist in the comments:
The only part I wish you'd added in was the extremely inspiring volunteers who spoke about organizing for Obama -- why they were here and what they wanted us to do.
The young woman who spoke about three generations of privilege and ended with, "To whom much is given, much, much, much is expected." The West Philadelphia group led by a charismatic young woman who talked about how she canvassed in Delaware, in Maryland and finally got it going in Philly way before anyone else figured out that the state was in play.
These were the real heroes.
Barack was ok ;)
They shared stories of why they were there. We were given time to visit with people sitting next to us; to talk about what brought us here. And we all took out our cell phones and called people to ask to help with the campaign. They said with 1500 people there we would all have to knock on 1400 doors each to cover all democrats in the City. But if each of us gets 10 people to help; it's only 10% of 1400 or 140; that is definately doable. So we got busy right away to get help.
It was great to call my friends saying: "Obama is about to come out and talk to us and he asked me to call you to come help with the campaign. Will you?" Who could say "no" to that?
The view from my seat:
These folks were selected to be the backdrop for the TV cameras:
The lead up to Obama's entrance was just insane. I can't remember the last time I have been so excited. I think it was the last time I saw the Grateful Dead live.
Obama came in and the place just went nuts. Everyone was standing on chairs, taking pictures, screaming, yelling. Nobody could see anything because everyone was on their feet and the floor was level. After awhile, Obama started talking and the place would just not settle down. Half the people there were scraming "sit down."
I can't remember much of what he said in the first 10 minutes, but he called us a really "fiesty" crowd. There was just way too much confusion and commotion to focus on his words. I can't describe it really; the feeling of connection was so overwhelming, I coudn't even hear any words.
Here are some shots I got of Obama:
Obama ended the talk with a long story about how he stumbled upon the "Fire it up, ready to go" chant. Then, of course, we did it. Electricity was flowing down my spine. We are a big team with a big mission. Lots of work to do.
Here is me with my friend; she actually took that picture. Not bad, eh?
Update2: Another diary of the event from another Kosack
Well, this picture sums it up nicely: