A newborn named Barrack Jeremy Obama at a hospital in Kenya. Babies in Kenya are being named after the US President-elect. (AP)

Washington, Nov. 6: Travelling from Chicago to Washington during the week which includes January 20, 2009? Forget it.

Want to book a hotel in Washington or in a Virginia or Maryland town close to the US national capital during the same week? Don’t try unless you have deep pockets.

All train tickets from Chicago to Washington on January 18 and 19 next year and for return journeys on January 21 have already been snapped up by people who want to attend the history-making swearing-in of this country’s first black President at the Capitol.

Nearly every hotel in Washington has already been sold out for Inauguration Day on January 20. “Obamania” is now spreading to suburban towns with hotels and motels in Maryland and Virginia which are close to Washington.Hotels in such towns like Fairfax and Gaithersburg have not only doubled or tripled their room rates for the inauguration, but insist that those who book must pay the full room rent in advance and they are non-refundable in case guests change their plans.

Thousands of Americans from states like Florida and Michigan, which elected Obama are now planning to hire buses, sleep during the overnight journey, use the bus toilets and camp out on the sprawling National Mall grounds facing the Capitol to watch Obama replacing George W. Bush in 75 days.

Several people wrote on blogs that even before the full presidential results were out on Tuesday night, they started looking for air tickets to Washington during the week that includes January 20.

As soon as Pennsylvania and Ohio were called into the Democratic victory column, many of them purchased their plane tickets online.

The hotly contested state of Pennsylvania was considered an indicator of which way the final result would go. But when Ohio voted for Obama, there was no more any doubt in the minds of political junkies that Republican McCain had no chance of winning the White House.

Talk show hostess Oprah Winfrey has already chosen her gown to wear for Obama’s inaugural ball. But she is not yet revealing more. It was Winfrey’s endorsement of Obama early in his quest for the White House that turned his primary campaign into an effort that captured popular imagination.

Several Obama supporters such as actors/actresses Susan Sarandon, Tim Robbins and Ben Affleck were keen to attend Obama’s acceptance speech on Tuesday night but they were asked not to attend to prevent TV cameras from focussing on these celebrities instead of the President-elect. But they will all grace his swearing-in.

Singer Beyonce said on television yesterday about January 20: “I am there. I can’t wait.… We are ready to do whatever they want... if they need me to sing, I am there, and I am ready.”

As counting was going on in the presidential election, a Florida couple named their child after Obama. Sanjae Obama Fisher was born at 8pm on election night at a hospital in Hollywood, Florida.

The print medium is a dying industry in the US and newspaper circulation is falling across the board. But Wednesday was a day of hope for the newspaper industry.

For the first time that anyone can remember, there was a long queue at The Washington Post office to pick up souvenir copies of the newspaper that proclaimed Obama’s win.

In Obama’s home town of Chicago, the local daily, the Chicago Tribune, sold 200,000 extra copies of Wednesday’s edition. The Washington Post ran an additional print run of 150,000 copies and The New York Times sold 50,000 copies more.

On the streets of Washington, enterprising vendors who operate roadside stalls framed pages of Time and Newsweek covers that featured Obama during the campaign and sold them to collectors.