Menz and Mendel soon found themselves at a multi-family home. The pair, unable to find the specific front door they were looking for, tried the garage door.

Moments later, the door rose, stiff wheels creaking as it came up. A woman emerged and responded enthusiastically to the questions.

“Oh, I like him. I’m going to vote for him,” the woman said.

Another man, his baby in one arm and his young son by his knees, told Mendel and Menz that he planned to bring his older child to the voting booth along with him.

Mendel had found during past experiences that “most people just really don’t want to talk to you.” This effort, however, was much more successful: “The people that we did talk to didn’t tell us to go away,” he said.

“It was a pretty friendly neighborhood,” Menz added.

A VOICE ON THE GROUND

At 4:30 p.m., students began to gather in the garage of the campaign headquarters, grabbing snacks and swapping stories.

“I had a great experience,” said Micaela Pacheco Ceballos ’15, a campus coordinator for the Harvard for Obama team. “Out of the 40 houses that we visited, we talked to 10 people.”

Pacheco Ceballos said that the “stark differences” between the candidates and a sense of “civic duty” had motivated her to get involved in the campaign, mentioning that she had successfully reached out to a young, first-time voter.

“Even if it’s just one guy that asked to register to vote, we made a difference,” said Rebecca V. Park ’16, who campaigned in 2008 with her parents.

Harvard for Obama Campus Coordinator Sylvia A. Percovich ’15 canvassed although she cannot vote as she does not have U.S. citizenship.

“I could participate and give back to what I consider my country,” said Percovich. “If I didn’t have a voice in the ballot, I can have one on the ground,”

Percovich said she was pleasantly surprised by some residents’ willingness to talk with a stranger about a matter that, for some, can be very personal.

“People are really excited about the election, so they’re willing to engage you,” she said, alluding to one of her conversations with an undecided voter.