Soheili's Blog: Making History!!

Part 1 - Inaugural Concert & Red Goes Blue party!

So, we've been quite slow on the blogging lately... but we have a great excuse: we've been busy MAKING HISTORY!!!!! :) HA!

The last few weeks were inauguration-mania here in DC and we decided to jump in and embrace every minute of it!

During the weeks prior to January 20th, inauguration was all we heard about - TV, friends, internet- the build-up was SO exciting we could hardly wait for it to finally happen. We knew there would be MASSIVE crowds, road closures and enormous metro delays- but were so excited, we knew it would all be worth it (& we're lucky to be within walking distance to everything downtown!)

On Sunday, we started the week off right with the Inaugural Concert. A group of our friends came by before hand and we drank mimosas, champagne, and possibly a few tequila shots!! ;) We headed out on foot to the National Mall & Lincoln Memorial area where the concert was being held.

The crowds were UNbelievable- but we managed to get a good spot on the mall in front of the Washington Monument, right in front of one of the jumbo-trons. The star-power was insane- U2, Beyonce, Bruce Springsteen, BONO, John Cougar Mellencamp, Tom Hanks, Samuel L. Jackson, Shaquira, Sheryl Crow, Stevie Wonder, but I honestly think Garth Brooks was the best performer. He had the entire crowd singing SHOUT & American Pie! It was all so incredible- you could feel excitement & unity in the crowd, all of us singing together.

We had a great time, took in Obama's speech, some of us cried (haha, ME!), and then decided to start navigating our way through the crowds to head home. It was crazy to see huge crowds of people just walking in the middle of the streets, all blocked from cars.

Here are some pics from the Sunday concert (& before):

with just a few of the MANY service men at EVERY block downtown!

Sie & I :)

Our friends Joe & Katie

the whole group when we arrived at the Washington Monument

Just a LITTLE excited!!

Views of the massive crowd!!!

Sie & I amidst the crowd!

Amanda sportin her Obama gear :)

we have tooons of pics of all the stars on the jumbo tron, even some good ones of Barack's AMAZING concert speech (which had me in tears), but I have to post who I think was the best performer that day: GARTH BROOKS!
who would have thought- but I have to give it up to anyone who can get the entire crowd singing for 3 songs in a row - "American Pie", "You make me wanna SHOUT", and "We Shall be Free!" He really rocked!

We ended up all back at our house (after a semi-hellish attempt at grabbing food at a restaurant) with me making a variety of dips and ham sandwiches - hahaha! We all laid low, recovering from the excitement & trying to pull together energy for the "Red goes Blue" event that night at the Old Ebbitt grill. Our friend Andy's cousin was throwing the event (he's a lobbyist for FedEx), we were really excited.

The Red Goes Blue event was a total hit- the food was fantastic (hors dourves like fried oysters & crab cakes), there were almost no lines for the bar (a miracle, right?) and the music was awesome! we danced it up with our friends & ended our first inaugural day with a bang!

The whole gang!