• Students run through streets celebrating Obama victory
• Some profanities uttered
• Not everyone enthused about president-elect

Chanting and banging on drums, hundreds of students thundered through the streets last night expressing their support of Barack Obama, the next president of the United States.

Students crammed into cars plastered with posters and sped down Wisconsin Avenue. Other students ran out onto the streets, darting and dashing through the cars that honked in approval. Still others linked arms and skipped down the street singing.

Patriotic chants of "U.S.A." rang through the air.

"Let's do this every day for the next four years," a faceless student screamed from the depths of the crowd.

His declaration was followed by an eruption of cheers.

The horde of students began at McCormick Hall and ran toward the Alumni Memorial Union. They flowed out onto Wisconsin Avenue and rallied in the street between 15th Street and Olin Engineering Center. The group continued through the lobby of Raynor Library and back through Schroeder Hall. They proceeded to 16th Street and Wells Street, then back to McCormick. The group went back for round two through the AMU and the library and down to Straz Tower Hall.

Many students said they didn't know exactly what was going on, but just followed the crowd and the immense commotion.

Hiriam Bradley, a freshman in the College of Communication, led the crowd with friends Andrew Fowler, a freshman in the College of Education, and Kiarri McBroom, a freshman in the college of Arts & Sciences.

The pack-leaders said they kept a close eye on incoming poll results from their rooms in McCormick.

"The margin was so big we just had to come out here and lead the pack," Bradley said.

"We're all for change," McBroom added. "We just wanted to be here for a change."

McCormick desk receptionists Beth Russo, a senior in the College of Education, said she immediately knew Obama had locked the vote when she heard screams emitting from the rooms upstairs. Russo said she then heard residents rumble down the stairs, through the hallway and out the door.

As the crowd went by, Russo said she saw a sole McCain supporter hugging a McCain poster held to his chest.

He wasn't saying a word, "almost in disbelief," she said.

Students working at the Circulation Desk at Raynor Library said they heard the crowd charging down the street and weren't surprised when students entered the library.

Students came through the lobby taking pictures and screaming "Obama!" said Natasha Eslami, a senior in the College of Arts & Sciences.

"It was very inspiring but some people got mad," Eslami said.

Leslie McGrath, a senior in the College of Nursing who also works at the desk, said one library-goer yelled at the roaring students to "get the f*** out of the library."

Both McCain and Obama supporters were met with profanity and vulgar name-calling as they raged through campus.

Sean Ivers, a junior in the College of Communication, said someone told him to "f*** off" as he and his friends expressed their delight in Obama's election by chanting and banging on a metal pot.

"We decided we needed to hit the streets," Ivers said. "I brought a pot to make noise to exemplify how excited I am."

Ivers and his friends marched from 17th Street to the Obama party at the Hyatt. There Ivers started a chant that he said the crowd echoed: "I don't know what I've been told; George Bush is getting old; I don't care what Republicans say; Barack Obama's gonna save the day."

Mary Walz-Chojnacki, a Marquette alumna, said she and her children attended the Hyatt Regency Hotel, 333 W. Kilbourn Ave. She stopped her car on Wisconsin Avenue to honk at Obama-supporting passersby.

"We're totally celebrating our time for change and we're totally psyched," Walz-Chojnacki said.

But not everyone was so spirited about Obama's victory.

Sumeet Uttamchandani, a freshman in the College of Arts & Sciences, said he wished America had chosen someone with more foreign policy experience and first hand military experience. Uttamchandani is from New York and knew 15 people who died on Sept. 11. But he said he recognizes students' right to parade through the streets.

"As much as I don't like it, the fact is they have this freedom," Uttamchandani said. "All soldiers died and gave them this freedom. I hope they recognize that. I'm happy they have the right to get out and do what they do."

Uttamchandani added that he hopes no one died in vain. At this point, he said he hopes Obama will do the right thing.

"Now I have to be supportive of Obama," he said. "I don't have a choice."