My shoulders are a little lighter - it's no longer necessary to cringe when I reply "American"

I can't imagine that ever before has a person been watched by more people at once than Barack Obama yesterday. Yes, mostly that's due to technological advances and the ever-increasing political connectedness around the globe; but people weren't just watching him as a man who will shape arguably the most powerful country's decisions. That country's decisions affect many persons' daily lives, and so they're watching him, looking to him, as a man that will have an influence, however big or small, in their futures, hoping that that influence will be positive. Everyone wants an Obama magic touch in their neighborhood.  But we must be careful not to sit idly by, wishing and waiting.  I hope our new president provides a figure to emulate, of all things, so that people might strive to embody the change they seek in others.

All smiles today:

Oh, and did I mention I'm proud of my country for choosing him? Yes, after seven years of globe-trotting, I must say that for the first time I don't cringe when people discover I'm American. I don't hesitate to answer when they ask "Where are you from?" 

Whether you/I/we like it or not, when one is abroad one is inevitably a representative of his or her country, and he or she is associated with the message which that country emits to the world. Thankfully, however, I've found recently (in the past year or two) that most people do indeed have the ability to think for themselves, and are compassionate, and have separated American people from George W. Bush, and always let me know upon finding out that I'm American that they understand that not all a government's people support its administration. 

It wasn't always like that though. It used to be emotionally draining to be discovered as an American. I remember March 2003 when the war in Iraq started. I was in Australia, and my study abroad program director advised us all to buy Canadian pins and stickers, to put them on our bags, wear them on our shirts. I'm not sure if that was to protect us from physical violence, angry verbal scoldings, or the embarrassment and guilt that one felt as an American there. But I know that since March 2003 I've been weary of responding "American" when people ask my nationality. 

But alas, that disquiet has dissolved, for the most part anyway.  Last week when traveling through The Gambia to get to southern Senegal for a work trip, a border patrol police saw on my passport that I was from Illinois, and he notified everyone at the post that I was from the same state as Barack Obama. If he had said 'the same state as Bush', I would have felt an urgent need to defend and explain myself, as was previously the case when someone confirmed my American nationality and then asked difficult & unanswerable questions accompanied by looks of disdain. (As I stated above, however, that was increasingly followed by 'But I understand that not all people think like their governments,' and a warm welcome.)  This time, however, there was no need to apologize, no cringing necessary.  This time there were only big smiles and cheers, on their part as well as mine; and that's the exact moment I realized the change - when I felt a huge, unstoppable smile on my face accompanying the confirmation of my American identity. I was suddenly aware that I felt safe, happy, and perhaps even proud and a little respected as an American. All this for the first time in my adult life living abroad. 

And not just because of a man and his aspirations, but because we voted for him.

Now let the clean-up begin.

(Political views aside, these have been my lived experiences in 15 countries in the past 7 years - rich countries, poor countries, white, brown, black countries, and Catholic, Christian, and Muslim countries.)