Inauguration on Campus

On January 20th, 2009 my NMC 301 class met in the MU lounge to prepare ourselves for an eventful night. It was our job to go out onto campus and talk to people that we wouldn't normally talk to and get their response to the Presidential Inauguration that took place that morning. Right of the bat I was excited, because it’s not very often you are given the excuse to go talk to random people, especially during class. I loved getting this opportunity because I enjoy meeting and talking to new people. After preparation I teamed up with Diego and Ryan because they were the guys sitting next to me and they were the first people I talked to. Surprisingly, Diego and I had actually met once before and didn’t realize it until we got to talking. Once the group was assembled we were off.

The first attempt at approaching someone was probably the hardest one, I wasn’t too sure how everything was going to play out so I was a little nervous at first but once I shook his hand all my jitters went away. After walking away I remember Ryan saying “looks like we got a social person on our team! Justin you are our interview person,” ha ha thank you Ryan. I didn’t actually interview everyone we ran into, and overall our group did a great job acquiring a good amount of responses. The people that gave input seemed to be either shy or willing to share what they experienced. Many of the responses were that it was a very moving day or they didn’t watch it in the first place. We ran into one student in the MU who was really excited on the subject he was shouting “it’s a great day to be in America!” he even had an Obama t-shirt on. It was great being able to find someone with such great enthusiasm. We also met a bunch of people at the library, making sure not to disturb them of course. That was where we found the republican who wasn’t very happy about the whole Inauguration and said “it was probably one of the worst days ever.” I actually got a Facebook friend request from one of the people we met, little scary but none the less I felt pretty cool! It’s crazy to think about how many people are willing to talk if they are actually talked to in the first place. This was a great experience and I look forward for more to come.