The Election

Although many individual students at the school have been showing interest in the U.S. election for the past few weeks, the school itself did not officially address the event until last Monday, November 3rd. On that day the school asked a U.S. history teacher from America to speak during an all school meeting about the election-including the candidates, the voting process, and the chief, relevant issues in American and world affairs. The students, as a whole, are clearly pro-Obama. In the student mock election, for example, Obama won 163 to McCain's 11. The next morning at the all-school meeting one of the students made an announcement, reminding everyone not to ask someone whom he/she is voting for, as many people consider this rude. I think the students thought that this applied only for the student mock election, however, because all during Election Day students were asking me whom I had voted for. Anyway, the school decided to celebrate the U.S. election in two ways. The first was to have a dress-down day for November 5th, when students would be allowed to wear any pants with either a red, blue, or black/white top; depending on which candidate they supported. Of course, by the time the school day had begun, Obama had already won the election. This brings me to the second way the school celebrated. The school invited the entire community to come to the dining hall at 5:00 am on November 5th to watch the end results live on CNN. I wasn't sure at first if I wanted to wake up this early on an already busy day for me but I then decided that it's always fun to wake up early to see something you certainly don't see everyday. In other words, I came to me senses and decided that, of course, I was going to witness the end to my first election, and possibly one of the most important elections in history. I got to dining hall by 5:08, grabbed some pita and hommus, and sat down for 2 hours. I unfortunately had to leave towards the end of Obama's post-victory speech because I had to get ready for the day and to check in students at all-school meeting. At 5:08, when I got there, I estimate that there were about 15 people, both students and teachers. Then, around 6:00 (around when Obama had won), I'd say there might have been about 40 or 50 people there.