"Mister O"--Peut-il changer le monde?

I feel the need to say something profound about the elections. It does not need to be said that I am ecstatic about the result. On Tuesday I didn't plan to stay awake to watch the results--but at 6 a.m. on Wednesday I was woken up by people honking through the streets in excitement. The reaction here isn't what expected, though. I thought that people would be simply happy that the Bush's terms were over--that the war in Iraq will end sooner rather than later and that the United States will be more cooperative on the international front.

But the election means a lot more than that over here. A LOT of my non-American friends cried when Barack Obama was declared the winner. Last night I watched a television show with a bunch of pundits discussing whether or not "Mister O" can change the world. It sounds strange, but people think that the election in the US will somehow have direct impacts upon their own lives.

There is also the racial significance. My own reaction is to be pessimistic about the "racial revolution" of his election. Bush made it really easy for a Democrat to get elected, and Obama's strength in economics helped a lot too. But just because a majority of Americans voted for a candidate of African origins doesn't mean that the politics of race have changed a lot in the US. But people here of all origins have interpreted this as hope for better relations between people of all nationalities. My own hope (after hearing friends and family telling me about people in Mississippi saying that Obama is the antichrist and threatening to move to South America or wherever...) is that people in the US who do not believe in racial equality will change their attitudes once Obama's policies and changes start positively affecting them. Maybe as people here hope--this will somehow ameliorate race relations worldwide too.

In light of the elections peoples' reactions to me have changed too. I was at a Middle Eastern grocery store the other day, and (as always, no matter how good my French is...) my accent attracted attention, and he asked where I was from. "Oh!! We are all SO HAPPY about the election! Even the children!" It strikes me as strange that people are so quick to forget the hostilities they had towards Americans during the Bush administration, and their reaction has changed into something closer to praise---as if I personally have done something to better their lives. I can't tell you how many times since the election I have heard people say the word "revolution" and have talked about how the world is now moving in a positive direction.

My initial reaction to all of this is that Barack Obama cannot live up to the hype. BUT I have been reading a lot about how he is trying to immediately reverse a lot of Bush's policies that were moving the country backwards so I am hopeful that he will be able to change a lot. As for how much he can change on the world stage--I am not sure. I think that at least there will be a different world atmosphere. The US domination of international foreign policy caused a lot of uneasiness over here, and I think at the very least a great international spirit of cooperation will be at least one positive affect for people here.

Anyway that's all I will say about politics for now. It is not my intention to put up a politicized blog, but to give you the reactions of people in France about what's going on...

There is really not a whole lot to tell about the rest of my trip to Almeria. Carlos and I didn't even end up celebrating our anniversary at all because it was too rainy to go anywhere. We ate more tapas, watched a bunch of movies and bummed around town--normal stuff.

I did make it back to Nancy without having to spend the night in Paris, but it took a whole day of planning to succeed at this. I knew I wouldn't have time to check my bag so I had to be very sneaky about how to get my too big backpack on the plane. This involved making sure not to go to the desk of the woman who made everyone check their bag for size, walking sideways or backwards so the airline workers couldn't see how enormous my backpack was, etc. It also included running through Paris (again!) from one station to another--but I did it!

I told my friends that when I got back from Spain that we would need to hang out a lot so that I could surmount my inevitable post-vacation depression--and they have followed through. We have gone out almost every night for the past week. Friday night we went to a symphony concert which featured a famous violinist. I met some American girls in the bathroom who joined us, and later Ruth came with a friend who was visiting her who--turns out I went to high school with (proving once again that it is a small world--a tiny world in fact). Saturday one friend decided we should all get together for a big Lebanese meal so I cooked tabouli and spinch pies and collaboratively with my friend Kat--falafel. I must say I am proud of of the way everything turned out--especially after my many many recent cooking failures. Maybe there's hope for my cooking future after all.

Friday was my meeting at the Prefecture in order to deliver all of my paperwork to get my carte de sejour. The woman I talked to was unbelievably friendly, nice, and efficient. This almost makes up for the fact that they asked me for a paper which was not on the list of needed papers, and now I have to back and spend all day in the waiting room just to give it to them. In any case, the demarche to get my carte de sejour is started, and once I deliver the last paper, all that will be left for me to do is wait.

Today is a public holiday--Armistice Day, and, and I don't work tomorrow. Off to "profiter" from my free time. Hasta luego