The last few days of May

Memorial Day



The four of us roommates were deciding what to do on Memorial Day, so we ended up splitting up, and Janelle and I beat the crowds and wandered over to Dupont Circle. It's this great neighbourhood with plenty of pubs, cute boutiques,  and cafes. One thing DC doesn't have a lot of is chain restaurants. Other than Mcdonalds, and Starbucks (which is on every corner downtown), all the places to eat are local. We walked up Embassy Row, where there's about 50 embassies. The whole neighbourhood is nice, studded with beautiful gardens, expensive cars and big sidewalks. The most impressive embassies were Turkey (which has a mosque right beside it), South Korea, Ivory Coast.We walked around for about an hour and a half, and by then I was completely exhausted from the heat. It was about 100 degrees F by the time the afternoon rolled around. We sat down at this cafe called Cosi, enjoyed a great frappuccino in the shade and then continued on window shopping. In the middle of shopping, we stopped to stick our feet in the fountain at Dupont Circle. See video

Americans know how to do Memorials

Guidebook in hand, Janelle and I went touring around the city. Janelle has a friend from her University that’s also in DC for the summer interning, so we met him, Andrew and his roommate Martin from Massachusetts. They are both interning on the Hill for different Senators. We met at a Metro stop late morning and the four of us trekked around all day. We started at the White House, snapped a few pictures, walked through the Ellipse toward the Washington Monument. From there we walked west towards the WWII Memorial, which I thought was really great. It fits the bill for a memorial in DC: beautiful architecture, large columns, big stairways, and great words etched in stone. Since it’s Memorial long weekend, there were a lot of Veteran bikers in town, wearing leather vests covered with Army patches and what not. I talked briefly to a couple from Montreal. He was a Canadian Vet. The Memorial was very sombre, and overtaking and it made me think of what it would be like to live through WWII. Indescribable.

I then walked, with my three new friends, down the National Mall. We stopped first the Korean War Veteran's Memorial on our way to the Lincoln Memorial. This is a MUST SEE monument. I've done a far bit of travelling; I've seen the coliseum, the pyramids and enjoyed a lot of great Italian architecture, but this memorial was breathtaking. It's built in a Greek temple style, and it really does feel like it. For those of you who have stood in the Pantheon in Rome, you'll know what I'm talking about. It's very similar to that. The Memorial feels like it holds power. Lincoln's second inaugural speech is etched on one side of the building and the other is the Gettysburg Address. As I read them, it's almost as I felt the reverberation of the powerful words that he once spoke. He was a great leader, perhaps the greatest American president of all time, and I could almost feel the burden of the country during the Civil War weighing on him. It was also really amazing to stand right where Martin Luther King Jr. stood as he delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech in 1963. Not to be cheesy, but I could feel the history.
SORRY about the weird font thing. I've tried re-formatting it, but these few paragraphs are being beyond stubborn.

Vietnam Veteran's War Memorial

The Vietnam Veteran's War Memorial is also incredible and humbling. My guide book describes it as “a black granite V cuts into the Mall, just as the war it memorializes cut into the national psyche.” I was there on a Saturday afternoon, and there was a bit crowd around it, but everyone slowly walks past it being very respectful of was the Memorial represents. So many people sacrificed their lives for others. I know people say that a lot, but just think, all those names represent people who died for others. It’s overwhelming. I reached out my hand like all people do to feel the names etched in the granite, and it sent shiver down my spine. My dad told me this before I went and saw it, but for those of you who don’t know, it was designed by an undergrad who was 21 at the time and her idea was to create wound in the ground to represent the gravity of the loss of soldiers. And I definitely felt it.

Nancy Regan inaugural gown in 1981.

My first Smithsonian Museum was the National Museum of American History. I have 3 highlights from there: 1) The flag from that inspired The Star-Spangled Banner. This flag flew over Fort McHenry in Baltimore during the War of 1812. It is really big, and displayed in an awe-inspiring way. I said “wow” when I first saw it. 2) Abe Lincoln’s top hat. There is a special exhibition there until the end of the month about Lincoln, and it was pretty incredible. I didn’t know this, but his wife Mary was a foot shorter than him. 3) The last highlight would be the 1^st Lady Collection, and all the inaugural ball gowns on display. Michelle Obama’s dress, jewellery and shoes are on display. Although similar to Michelle’s dress I preferred Nancy Regan’s gown ($22 500 worth of beauty). It is absolutely stunning. And of course Jackie O.’s gown is gorgeous. From the mannequins all the First Ladies seemed quite fit, with the exception of Barbara Bush, and her blue velvet disaster. Mind you, it was the 80s.

I’m a big fan of art galleries, and the National Gallery of Art is a must-see in Washington. It holds over 110, 000 objects, so I’m definitely going back there to take it all in. My favourite there was the Presidential Portrait Gallery. Andrew Jackson’s and Ronald Regan’s were very beautiful. And the actual architecture of the museum is amazing. I was comparing it to the National Art Gallery in Ottawa, and I think I like them equally. One just feels Canadian, and the other feels American.

The Hope Diamond is on display at the American Museum of Natural History. I was pretty tired by then, but I still could appreciate the beauty of a 31 carat blue diamond. I’ll probably go back there later. The greatest part of this day, was that all this didn’t cost a cent. The only money I spent all day was for lunch and the Metro.

My roommate Janelle has some friends who’ve lived here for about a year so we went over to their house in the evening for margaritas. They were pretty hilarious, and they gave us a locals DC orientation, and told us all about things that “were so DC.” They live in a really great neighbourhood, and I wish I could have taken pictures of the houses, but it was too dark. They called it the Brooklyn of DC. They gave me some really good tips, like read The Hill to stay in the loop about what’s going on, on the Hill, and to get a gmail account (which I already do), because everyone who’s anyone google chats.

My internship starts next week, and it’s out in Arlington, so I wanted to take a test run on the Metro to see how far it took to get out there. On Sunday, two of my roommates came with me, Prium and Janelle, and we also met up with Janelle’s friend Andrew. Arlington National Cemetery was on the agenda, and we walked about the 600 acres for about 3 hours. It was amazing. There were a lot of families and friends visiting graves and dropping off flowers. So it felt very real. I saw the changing of the guard at the grave of the Unknown Soldier. Janelle looked it up later, but the army men guarding it volunteer for the position, and they have to march back and forth in front of it, in full dress uniform in the heat. I could not believe it. I was melting the whole day and I was only wearing a T-shirt and shorts. Here’s a link, if you’re into that kind of thing. Arlington Cemetery Website

The Kennedy’s gravesite sits at the top of the hill, and the view from there is spectacular. I could see the Potomac River, the Pentagon, Capitol Hill and the Washington Monument all while looking down on acres of gravesites and jets were constantly flying into the DCA airport. It’s pretty spectacular. There are quite a few other famous people there, a few chief justices, but we didn’t see them all.

This picture doesn't do it justice!

The other really cool thing we did today was lunch at Ray’s Hell Burger. It’s in Arlington, pretty close to where I work. I was pretty disgusted when they asked me how I’d like my burger done, but then I remember this is America. The selection of burgers is pretty incredible, so if you’re ever in DC, go here! Obama and Biden stopped in here once, or so my guide book tells me. The burger I had at lunch has kept me full for hours. I thought of my brothers, who'd just eat this place up.

Friday, Friday

Hey all,

The DAR in Constitution Hall

Today started with the last few sessions of orientation. All the TWC interns met at the Department of the Interior first thing in the morning. My three roommates are in the law program here, but since it was a mandatory meeting for everyone we rode the metro together. It was actually a really nice temperature this morning, around 8-8:30. 20 degrees or so. Walking from the metro we passed by some amazing buildings, including the DC headquarters for the Daughters of the American Revolution. It's quite an impressive building. Actually, now that I think about it, everything in DC is impressive. All the buildings are huge, the steps are big, the pillars are big, the paths in the National Mall are big, the Washington Monument is big... Anyways back to the Department of the Interior. All 660 TWC interns met there this morning, and we were welcomed by the Chief Operating Officer, Jennifer Clinton. She encouraged us to put into this internship what we want to get out of it. She talked a lot about not just being good, but being great, and how we need to take advantage of the opportunities we are going to have during these 10 weeks. On that note, The President of TWC talked to the International Affairs group yesterday, and he explained the 10-70-20 rule. Whether it be a major corporation, a government department or a non-profit organization, there are three types of people. 10% of the people in a corporation during a year are in the will be fired, or are in the process of being fired. 70% of the people are doing a good job, keeping the corporation on track, and 20% are building to the organization, and being innovative. He challenged us to be in the top 20%. I thought it was quite inspiring.

My roommates, walking bossy. From the left Aliya from Stockton College in New Jersey, Prium
from Rutgers University also in New Jersey, and Janelle from the University of Central Florida.

Then we got the run-down from some other TWC employees on professional dress, sexual harassment, how to make a good impression, and how to be professional when it comes to using technology. Did you know that the Library of Congress keeps records of every Tweet ever posted? Even Facebook the government can get their hands on all of that information. Even if it was deleted, or you deleted your entire profile, they can still access the history of FB and whatever you deleted.  One of the directors of Student Life, Chris Mason talked a little bit about networking, and the power greet. I went to a breakout session on networking later in the afternoon, and he had a lot really good pointers.

 We also had a motivational speech given to us by Marvin Worthy about diversity, and becoming great. He was very engaging, and spoke like a Baptist Preacher. He talked about his childhood in South Carolina, and his teenage years in North Philadelphia. He shared some unbelievable anecdotes about racism that he experienced growing up in the 60s-70s and 80s. He used this really great metaphor of a salad as he was describing what diversity is. I know it sounds kind of lame right now, but he had the whole rooms attention for an hour or so. He said we need to build relationships from the inside out, and we can't afford to only interact with people like ourselves. When we interact with people across religion, race, ethnic borders we don't lose ourselves, we share ourselves. He encouraged us to be hungry for knowledge at the cost of our comfort, and to appreciate being chosen from TWC.

Auditorium at the Department of the Interior

 So that orientation wrapped up at around noon. We came back to the RAF, had a quick lunch and went to some break out sessions. One of the projects I have to do is called a Civic Engagement Project, which means some sort of work in the community volunteering. So I went to session about that, and it started with a great video about human empathy. The Empathic Civilization


After dinner, I went out running with my roommate Janelle. We decided to run south to Capitol Hill, which only took us 5 minutes, and then all of the sudden the Supreme Court was right there, and Capitol Hill. Then like a true DC-er, we ran down the National Mall, past all the amazing Smithsonian museums, circled around the Washington Monument, waived at the White House, then headed back. It was about a 5 mile loop. But as we were just passing by the Canadian Embassy, a storm quickly blew in, and it got really windy, then started to pour almost instantaneously. All the tourists went a little crazy running for shelter, but we just kept on going, because we didn't really have a choice. We brought our metro passes just in case so we thought about ducking into the metro, but the rain subsided and we didn't need it use it. We got soaking wet, but we both laughed about it, saying it would make for a good story on our blogs :).

Day 1 and I'm in love

DC!!!!!!!


Oh my word, what a great city! I've arrived, and survived my first day here so I'll try and rewind and re-cap some things that have happened so far.

My flight was late arriving in DC yesterday afternoon, but I got to the Washington Center just in time to check in. The Residence and Academic Facility (RAF) is where I'm living in the NE. Washington is split into 4 quadrants, with Capitol Hill right in the middle. It's a really great building in what was explained to me as an "up and coming neighborhood." I guess it used to be kind of run-down, but there's lots of construction and new condo buildings going up. The neighborhood's being branded as Noma, meaning North of Massachusetts Ave. There's a metro stop just a 5 minute walk away. 


So going back, I arrived, unpacked a bit, went to our building orientation, looked around the building, met my roommates, then a bunch of us headed on the Metro to swing by Target. I hadn't really eaten anything since Denver, so I stopped with my roommate Prium at 5 Guys. I guess 5 Guys originated here in DC, but the original place no longer exists. Needless to say, I had the tastiest cheeseburger yesterday after a long day of traveling.


This morning was my first day. All the students in the International Affairs program met in front of the RAF, and we kind of stuck together using the Metro (which was packed during the morning rush). We used the Red Line, and got off at Farragut North and walked 15-20 minutes to the World Bank. There was security right at the entrance, and then all of us interns recieved a labeled badge. Our meeting was in an Executive Board room on the 13th floor. There was a huge long board room table in the middle of the room with microphones and a big screen on the wall. I felt very official in my business professional gear. Anyways, the lady from the World Bank Speakers Bureau had about an hour and a half presentation giving us an overview on the history of the World Bank, and how it works. We had a few discussions about poverty reduction, and how it the World Bank began to help developing countries. She was talking about Millenium Development Goals made for 2015 regarding poverty reduction. So far, a lot of countries are on track, if not ahead of the goals. Then the presenter opened up the floor, and we had a good discussion on why Sub-Sahara Africa is so far behind, especially in terms of child mortality and maternal morality. She showed us this video called The Girl Effect, and I actually had a professor share it with a class I was in last semester, but I thought it's worth sharing here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1e8xgF0JtVg
There's also a cool World Bank website that is aimed at young people to get them involved with global issues.  http://youthink.worldbank.org/
My afternoon was spent in orientation, which I won't bore you with. All I can say is, it's going to be an amazing summer! :) After dinner I was just at my apartment with my roommates, and we decided to go out and walk around. So we jumped on the Metro and walked to the Washington Monument and then past the White House. It is such a beautiful area! The National Mall is this huge park, way bigger than I imagined! We went around 6:30-7, and I'm not sure if there was a tournament going on, but there were softball games being played everywhere on the grass between the White House and the Washington Monument. And so many runners. I guess the National Mall is the it place to run in DC. It's definitely on the to-do list.


I've got an early start tomorrow; I've got to be at the Department of the Interior at 8:45am, and I think it might take us an hour to get there, so I'm off to bed. I think I love this city already :)