We're off to see Obama..!

Yesterday morning I was fortunate enough to attend Obama's speech delivered in front of Prague Castle. I hadn't decided to go until the previous night, while at a pub with some Czech friends. Since, in the course of convsersation, some of them expressed interest in trying to go, I thought that I should go as well. After all, I told them, he's my president.

We met at around 8am; getting on a tram that would take us to the entry site (the entire castle district had been locked down since the previous midnight, I believe), we waited. And waited. Why wasn't the tram moving? People kept getting on, and then off, looking around wondering what was happening. The police/security with the menial task of traffic control were no help. Then we realized, due to the spontaneous rush towards the street, that the motorcade was going to pass in front of us.. and it did!

A few excruciatingly long minutes after that (we were very concerned by this point that the castle square would be closed off before we arrived), the tram lurched into motion, and we went up the hill, disembarking with the rest of the mob to scramble through the narrowest alley that leads to the castle. At one point, I thought to myself that we were something like Dorothy and her friends travelling down the yellow brick road in search of the Wizard. We were, after all, walking shoulder to shoulder over cobblestones with a pretty optimistic bounce to our step. I didn't bother voicing that to the others though, as the comparison pretty much ended there; the obvious lack of Munchkins was replaced by the not-exactly-covert presence of snipers on rooftops and in windows.

After getting through the metal detectors, all we had to do was wait, and look for a good spot to stand. Poor Martina, who was shortest of us four, was out of luck wherever we went.. especially after Obama got to the podium and we had everyone's arm-and-camera/cellphone-weilding-fist in our way. Fortunately there were some large display screens (with Czech supertitles). So although I didn't get to see him in the flesh, I could mostly watch him on the screen. The speech itself was good, and of course eloquently delivered (transcript here). I was surprised at the distinct lack of any mention of the proposed American radar station in the Czech Republic, something that has stirred a lot of controversy here. So, the speech and events leading up to it were, altogether, an exciting experience. But I wouldn't say I was swept off my feet by it.. and yet he said it himself:

"I know that a call to arms can stir the souls of men and women more than a call to lay them down."

What was particularly amusing about the whole affair was afterwards, some grandmother there just came up to us and started talking. Addressing some of her statements to me, I apologized to her since I didn't understand what she was asking. And then Martina told her I was American. Boy, did she light up at that. I was able to pick up some of the things she was trying to tell me, including (no joke!) her describing Barack Obama as a man second only to Jesus Christ. Then of course, she went on to ask me some of the typical questions.. What do I do here? Is Czech easy to learn? Prague is a beautiful city, isn't it? etc. We parted after she held my hands in hers, and offered some sort of benediction I didn't understand. I think that was more inspiring than the speech, actually.