I Have A Dream

The weather forecast for today was not looking to most......comfortable and there were thoughts of staying inside and out of the cold.  I watched the weather channel whilst doing a bit of googling and noticed that the temp rose by 2 degrees.  This was my window.  How often was I going to be in Washington DC?

So I put on nearly every piece of clothing I brought with me and headed out into the icy streets and headed to George Town. 

I walked 3 blocks up and one across to catch "The Circulator" (say it like Arny would say it).  It costs just $1, but when I tried to pay the driver told me the machine was broken and that I should just get on, like he was doing me a big favour.  Score!

George Town was lovely.  You were really only a few ams away from the centre of DC bit it was like you were in another town completely.  Everything was pretty.  The shop fronts were pretty, the side streets were pretty, the trees were pretty.  
Pretty! Pretty! Pretty!

It was time for a bit of morning tea when I came across this lovely French creperie.  I did think, if only my lovely cousin and travel companion were here already..... she's loves a good crepe!  It was warm and cozy and quaint...

... and they had hot chocolate.  This looks better than it tasted.  The chap who made it had only been in Washington, and in fact the US of A for about 3 weeks.  He had just moved there from Columbia.... maybe there is not a lot of call for hot chocolate there?

Down the road a bit was the George Town Cupcake shop. I think it would've been rude to not try one of their cupcakes.  I'm thinking of maybe becoming a Red Velvet Cupcake Connoisseur.  This one was to die for! 

 There was a men's clothes shop called "Keith's" and out side his shop he head a little doggy bar with water bowls...

...check out the water - frozen! 
 How many dopey dogs have had their tongues stuck to that I wonder? 

George Town is about 4-5kms away from the Lincoln Memorial, so I decided to stay warm by walking there (you're thinking a cab would have been warmer?  You'd probably be correct.)

Just to show you how cold it was - that's ice on the river!

 

This is the building where Martin Luther King Jnr famously made his "I have a Dream." speech at the end of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963.

According to Wikipedia, he was reading his speech when Mahalia Jackson called out from behind him, "Tell them about the dream" and so he went off script to deliver the most famous and most remembered part of his speech.

I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.'

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today.

 

It give me a kind of chilling (pardon the pun) feeling to be standing in the exact same spot that MLK stood.

For the kids reading, this is the same place that is in the Forrest Gump movie when Forrest is receiving a medal and Jenny calls out to him from the crowd and then they run into that water to meet and hug.

 Well, they must empty it in winter otherwise it would just freeze over.  Great for ice skating!  So it didn't look as good as it probably does in other non freezing seasons.

They even had to put up new fencing as the last one had fallen into the bit of left over water and frozen solid!

The day was still young, so I thought I would get in another couple of museums before the end of the day and walked for another 5kms or so back up to the area of Northwest where I was staying, near a lot of the museums.

I passed by the White House again..... still nobody waving me in.  Whatever.

I also just happened upon the house where Abraham Lincoln died, nestled in between these other buildings.

Right around the corner was Madam Tussauds.  I've never been to one before, even after living in London.  It always just seemed a bit touristy and although I love being a tourist.... this just went a bit too far.

And it went even further than I thought.  What a waste of money!

Because we're in Washington, MT has an extensive collection of presidents - in fact, all 44 of them which then limits the space for anyone else.  Considering I only recognise a hand full of presidents, the others were a bit wasted on me.  You are encouraged to take lots of photos, but the only one I really wanted to take was of my mate, Barack, but naturally they have a camera set up to take a picture for you - for free..... and they you have the choice to buy it at the end for $16.  I tried to explain to the woman who did not get this job for her intelligence nor her people skills that I had no interest in paying $16 for a photo.   

"But it's free to take".  

"Yes, I get that it's free, but I'm not going to buy it at the end, so there's no point in taking it in the first place."

"But you have the option to buy at the end, you don't have to buy."

"I don't really want to be in it, I just want to take my own picture."

"Well, you have to take it from behind that barrier, that's just policy and I don't make the policies.  But since my camera is not working, I can take one for you with you in on your camera."

"Well, that would be much appreciated."

"Oh, hold on, no my camera is working again, so..... I can't really do that now."

"What?"

See, there are other hands and fingers that are as stupidly small as mine.  Thanks Janet, it's like we're long lost sisters.... or better still - hand twins!

Yes George,  I will.

 Here are some stars who perhaps wouldn't be totally happy with their waxy likeness......

Can you even tell who they're meant to be?

Feeling tired, disappointed and totally ripped off, I headed for the International Spy Museum.  I obviously thought I had more stamina, brain power and interest than I did because this museum, although very interesting couldn't hold mine the whole way through and by the time I got to the James Bond section I'd had enough.

Next door was a Shake Shack.  Marie and I tried to got here one of these chain burger places in NYC a couple of times but each time there was a line out the door - in the freezing! So, now was my chance.  I had read about this place in a magazine somewhere about how good it was...... well, let while it was tasty, it didn't even come close to the best burger ever.  The fries were ok, but still not the flashest.

Thank goodness I walked 27kms today!

Brunch With The Obamas

My first job today was to call in on Barry and Michelle. 

They only live a few blocks from my hotel so I rugged up and set off.  Their house is much smaller than I imagined.  I thought they'd be expecting me but it turns out that they'd actually gone on holidays to Hawaii.  Hmm, perhaps they had meant for me to meet them there?

Anyway, they had quite a few police guarding all the gates and there was a row of tents set up for the media with cameras all set up, ready for action.

Here's the back yard

 The front yard

It was a grey old morning in the Nation's capital.  Grey, cold and it was starting to snow when I was taking these pictures.  The fact that I'd been dumped by the Obama's couldn't have made it any greyer.  Still, it was really pretty to wander around - freezing, but pretty.

3 lots of people asked me for directions.  I clearly look like a local.  One man asked me "Scuzi, Casa Bianca?"  so I gave directions in broken English like a complete boss!

Washington has lots of lovely old buildings.  In fact, you have to do a lot of searching to find anything new which is refreshing.  I love the old architecture and the detail they used to put into each and every corner.  They certainly don't make 'em like they used to.

I also came across this little guy.  He stopped for a brief moment to have his picture snapped, then he was off.  He was obviously a very busy squirrel.  Jobs on and such.

Next job for me 

Smithsonian Institution

I have always wanted to visit the Smithsonian.  I did initially think that it was one large museum, but, for those of you who also thought that, it's not. It is actually many separate museums.  A collection of collections, if you will.  So many, in fact, that it would be impossible to visit all of them in only 2.5 days.

But you have to start somewhere, so I started with the Portrait Gallery.

Like other portrait galleries, they have portraits dating back to the 1600's.  Those ones don't interest me as much as the more recent ones.  There was also a teen exhibition where kids created self portraits using all sorts of mediums from paintings to digital media.  One kid even carved his likeness out of wood!  Quite amazing!

Next stop was to the American History Museum.  There's a movie I love called "Julie and Julia" which is about the TV personality and French cooking for Americans cookbook author,  Julia Childs and another chick, called Julie who cooks everything in Julia's cookbook in 365 days.  At the end of the movie they visit this museum to see the Julia Child's exhibition.  

I had forgotten about that until I stumbled across it.  I loved the movie and I fell in love with Julia Childs, so this was a lovely surprise.

Another exhibit they're pretty proud of and of which I was super surprised and excited about was the Little Golden Books.  There is something about these books that I just love.  My favourite Golden Book ever was called "There's a Monster at the End of This Book" and it starred Grover.  It probably wasn't everybody's favourite childhood classic, but I loved that book and still have it.

Right next door was the Natural History Museum.  Now I have been to the one in New York twice and I do love it, but I did think, really? How different can they be?  I mean, New York and Washington probably have the same natural history, right?  So I skipped it and headed for the Air and Space Museum.

 To get from one to the other I needed to cross the National Mall, which is this long grassed area leading up to the Capitol Building in the distance...

Here's one close up.

 ...past the Smithsonian Castle where I stopped for a spot of lunch - a disgusting hotdog.  I took one bite and had to throw it away.  I hope America doesn't put me off junk food!

And finally - The Air and Space Museum.  Like all the museums, this one was chockas FULL off information.  Some might say too much information.  Way too much for one person to take in, especially if they are trying to cram as many museums into one day as I was.

The large, open foyer was filled with hanging flying machines. 

From manually operated bat wing machines...

...to the Space Module...

... to hot air balloon baskets.

Rightly so, the Wright Brothers had a whole exhibition room to themselves.

 Then there was a massive section on space and space exploration.

Soldiering on... the next museum on my list was the National Museum of The American Indian - right next door. 

Check out this building.  It opened in 2004 and took 15 years to build.  It's the first national museum dedicated exclusively to Native Americans.  It was clad in limestone in this shape to look like it had been naturally shaped by the wind and water over thousands of years.  There are no sharp corners inside either, all the walls are curved to keep the flowing movement throughout the building.  It actually reminded me of a museum Jen and I saw in Ottawa called the Canadian Museum for Civilisation which had similar shapes in coloured glass made to represent the Northern Lights - amazing!

This is the ceiling and the stairs inside the main hall. 

 By I time I had reached this museum I was pretty wiped out and if I'm honest I was just going through the motions of being there without really taking in any information.  I did finally find a section about Inuits that I was interested in so stopped to listen to the movie.  At that point a child came and sat on the floor behind me and screamed.  I had to replay the video three times so I could hear everything, then it was time to go.

Washington is not a massive place, so I walked mostly everywhere.  I guess this is also a way to keep warm, although a better way is to just stay inside.

A Winter Wonderland?

Yesterday I caught the train from New York to Washington DC and it was easy, but for some poor people it wasn't as smooth sailing as my journey was.

Two ladies hopped on the train in New Jersey and sat right next to me and immediately started talking about their plights.  They weren't actually traveling together, they're trains were cancelled and Amtrak, the train company were trying to do the right thing and so put them onto this train to push them further along their way to their final destinations.  One lady, an older lady with a poorly fitted wig was trying desperately to get to St Louis in Kentucky because her son was in the hospital.  She then proceeded to tell the other lady who was trying to get home to Chicago all about how each member of her family had died of cancer.  What type of cancer and where it was located in their bodies.

The conversation went a little like this (you have to imagine the voices to be slow, drawly New Joirsey accents):

St Louis: "I've got to ge to St Louis.  My son is in the hospital.

Chicago: "oh dear.  Do you only have one child?"

St Louis: "No, I have four children, but I have one sick child.  He has a chest infection and he's taking brain medication.  It's just like the cancer.  Everyone of my family has had the cancer...

(she then lists 7 of her family members - by name and location of the cancer)

Chicago: "Does your son smoke, because smoking is very bad for the chest 

infections."

St Louis: "He doesn't do drugs, he just takes his brain medication."

Chicago: "No, I didn't mean that he takes drugs, but if you DO take drugs or smoke or drink to excess, then these underlying problems can come out to the surface."

St Louis: "Well he doesn't do drugs."

Chicago: "Well, it's the second hand smoke that does the most damage you know."

St Louis: (losing interest in the conversation) "Well, I don't know anything about that."

Chicago: "My husband is a doctor and he knows about it."

With that last statement, St Louis picked up a pamphlet from the seat pocket and started reading it........ conversation over!

The view from the train

At home, I sometimes think 'wouldn't it be nice if it snowed?'  But only people who don't normally live in snowed in conditions ever think that.  I mean it's beautiful and everything, but when you think of the logistics, it's not as fun as it sounds.  For a start, it's cold.  And if you have a look at the picture above, it becomes dirty and messy and wet and slushy and it's sometimes icy and slippery and did I mention cold?

The traffic is slowed and sometimes halted to a complete stop.  The trains have to stop periodically to check underneath the train and if the snow covers the tracks then that's more delays right there.  Planes are grounded and then backlogged.  Some planes need to be rerouted because the initial destination is snowed in.  

The shops and buildings have the heating turned up to about 30℃ (Who can tell me what that is in °F?).  So whatever you've got on in layers, you need to start peeling these layers off one by one and even then you don't really start to cool down until you standing in the shop door way in your underpants!

In between the big cities the train passed through lots of little towns and they were blanketed with white.  In the cities you don't notice it, but passing the towns you could see people's houses and into their back yards with kids bikes and toys and trampolines all completely covered with snow.  In some towns where the snow must have fallen even harder you could only make out the shape of cars in the street.  Imagine waking up to that in the morning and having to get to work.  

 Lucky these people though about lifting up their windscreen wipers!

I remember when I lived in England I would carry my can of de-icer and an ice scraper in my handbag to get the ice off the windows on my car even before I could leave. 

You just do what you have to do.  

How lucky we are to live where we live!