A place that hears cheers from the crowd several nights a week was rocking around breakfast time today as thousands of happy Barack Obama fans flocked to the Oracle Arena in Oakland.
This morning the standing ovation came at the end of his inaugural address.
The inauguration was shown on large video screens in the arena.
At the head of the line to get into the arena when doors opened at 7:20 a.m. was Hayward resident Cassandra Kamara, who was raised in Oakland and attends the Acts Full Gospel Church in Oakland.
Kamara said she got in line at 5:30 a.m. and said, "I had no idea the line would be so long, but that's OK. It's worth it."
Bishop J.L. Bullock said of Obama's inauguration, "It seems like a clean slate and things have changed."
Smiling broadly at the end of the event, Bullock, said the swearing in of Obama as the nation's first black president "is a momentous moment of time and history that no man, woman or child will ever see again."
Bullock, who noted he was not affiliated with any church, said, "I just feel good we have a black president and he is for all the people."
The Oracle Arena event was called "Unity for the Sake of Change" and was organized by Alameda County Supervisor Keith Carson and other county officials.
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Kamara said she attended a Martin Luther King Jr. celebration at her church Monday, and people talked about the significance of Barack Obama becoming the nation's first black president.
Alameda County Administrator Susan Muranishi said organizers sold about 9,000 tickets to the event, but only 7,000 people came through the turnstiles.
