KEY POINTS:
HARLEM, New York - I step off the subway at 137th street - well into the jumble of West Harlem - and along the footpath dances Manny Cordas. 'Obama, Obama.' He chants, thrusting his raised forearms at people passing by. "People are only for one man here-Obama.'he says
when asked how he voted. He is from the Dominican Republic but wants to offer nothing more about himself. He dashes away down the street, smiling and darting between the street cart food sellers and clusters of young men jiving to hip hop.
It is lunchtime now on voting day, two blocks further on at 139th Street, where the great black singer, Billie Holliday grew up with her mother. The footpaths are a jumble of street stalls offering over-boiled frankfurters, burned sausages and pink ice cream. . Tee shirts with a large image of Barack Obama are on sale at US$5.00 for two. Watches with his face are US$15 and badges aplenty can be had for a couple of dollars.
Iesha Lewis, a 21 year old African-American mother has an Obama badge hanging from her dreadlocks. Her smile broadens and her eyes dance when I ask why she is voting for Obama.
"He speaks to our hearts. He is positive, not negative. My daughter is six years old. Even she wants to vote for him. My little brother is not of voting age. He likes to hang out and be a bit bad. But now he wants to be like Obama. He has found a role model.
"If you can get to the children, then you have the world with you," says Iesha.
All around are clusters of men - and some women. They are from the Dominican Republic, Honduras and even Africa's Ivory Coast. The world is in Harlem - and the soul of Black America. The long queues snake from the polling stations. There is a new lightness here today and a strange, anti-climatic feeling, as if a huge storm was about to break. The loud chaos of the campaign has gone quiet on the airwaves and in the newspapers. These ordinary men and women queuing in patient silence have had all power returned to them for a brief period. The fates of Barack Obama and John McCain, rests, finally with the people.
Once opulent and now jaded, run down apartment buildings and rows of brownstones line Harlem's wide streets - a testament to the well off Jews and Italians who lived here through the 19th Century and very early into the 20th. They left after the property price crash of 1904 and black people then arrived en masse. Newly restored homes stand out like flowers among them - testament to the whites and middle class African Americans who can afford the at least half million dollars a renovated home costs in Harlem. That's a fifth of what would be paid downtown. But their occupants are a source of some resentment.
Krmo Gnanu, 55 and a resident of Harlem since he arrived from the Ivory Coast seven years ago is in a voting queue. Unsurprisingly he will vote for Obama. "Maybe he will do something good for the economy. Maybe he will change America," says Krmo who has found part time work in a cut price clothes barn.
Luis Sarmento, 51 from Honduras has the drawn face and the hand-me - down clothes of a man whom the American dream has , so far, failed. Now on a disability allowance, he spends his days sitting on an upturned milk crate listening to West African music on the streets of Harlem. "This country really needs some change. For the old people. And for people with children," he says. "I hope this man Obama can do this."
It is now 3.15 pm here in New York. I am off to collect my daughter from her school.
Election results start coming in at approximately 6 pm eastern time (ET) Tuesday in America which is noon today in New Zealand. Statewide poll closings start at 7 pm ET, with polls remaining open in some states until 1 am
It will be a long, eventful night.
