Yesterday afternoon Burke and I met up with his parents in Georgetown for some light shopping and dinner plans. Our dinner plans were for a wonderful Italian restaurant called Filomena. Originally I heard about it while at Drury (I was watching the Travel Channel) and thought it would be a good experience to have. So yesterday morning Burke called ahead and made a reservation. It was definitely a good plan to do that. Before that we just wandered around the streets a little to see the shops (we did not go in anywhere but it was nice to explore). Then we found a little place right next door to Filomena which was a Chinese Tea House. We decided to go inside and see if we could get some tea before dinner. We all had different teas because it was sold on an individual portion size. I had Harmony tea (it was apples, oranges and passion fruit) it was really good and the color was similar to red wine. Burke had a jasmine tea which he enjoyed (I did not like it, because I don't like the flower teas). Marc had a variation on traditional green tea, it was apparently refreshing. Kelly had an Oolong tea which was really good, but a little strong for me. After our tea, and taking a few photos with it, we walked next door to Filomena for dinner and I was very excited.
Our dinner was absolutely amazing! I was so excited to be there and have the food. Our meal was amazing, although the portion sizes were huge. I ordered a dish called La Familia it was a twist on the traditional meatballs with rotini pasta and an amazing pulled beef and sausage meat sauce. Burke had a lobster dish that apparently tasted like lobster bisque but with noodles. His parents shared a penne dish with a meat sauce. The food was amazing, and then we all shared a piece of the Oreo cake they had. It was also really good, light and fluffy but tasted amazing and such a strong flavor. It was a good evening and I will be putting some photos on Facebook from the tea, I did not take any in the restaurant because the lighting was limited and I did not want to disturb other guests.
Sunday, July 29, 2012
Newseum
This blog post is long overdue, I will be the first to admit it. On July 15th Burke and I went to the Newseum, which was very informative. I have a few pictures that I need to add to Facebook, but not many, the Newseum was more informational heavy as opposed to a museum that people can take pictures. We read so much information about all different things. I of course saw the newspaper where it read "Dewey beats Truman" which everyone should know that we had President Truman, not President Dewey. We also saw the remembrance area for September 11th, and it was interesting because they had newspapers from all over the world with the front page being a story on what happened to the United States that fateful day.
Other than that I have been rather busy getting my portfolio completed, and professionally bound. Class is almost over, have one more on Tuesday which I just have to attend, but do not have anything to do. Burke's parents are currently here and I will have another post soon about our exploration with them yesterday. But Washington DC has been amazing although I am excited to get home to my family and my house!!
:)
Other than that I have been rather busy getting my portfolio completed, and professionally bound. Class is almost over, have one more on Tuesday which I just have to attend, but do not have anything to do. Burke's parents are currently here and I will have another post soon about our exploration with them yesterday. But Washington DC has been amazing although I am excited to get home to my family and my house!!
:)
Monday, July 9, 2012
Spies and Wax Figures.
On Sunday the plan was to hit a few places before lunchtime so that my Dad could get home at a decent time to have some time to relax before going in to work on Monday. Burke and I also needed some time to do some laundry and homework. We decided on Saturday night that we would spend Sunday morning together going to the Spy Museum and Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum. Let me tell you, it was so much fun!
The Spy Musuem was really neat and informative, but my god there was so much stuff everywhere! We spent over an hour walking around and we may have seen 50% of it all. There were just so many nooks and crannies and everywhere held information to read or things to look at. It was neat because it progressed through history starting with early spies from around the world and ending with the new threat of cyber spies and cyber security. One quote in the museum that I really appreciated was this one from James Woosley a former CIA Director referring to the Soviet Union's collapse, "We have slain a large dragon but we now live in a jungle filled with a bewildering variety of poisonous snakes. And in many ways the dragon was easier to keep track of." After checking out the Spy Museum Gift Shop we headed toward Madame Tussaud's.
Upon entering we immediately were placed into the presidential section. It was really cool to see the "presidents" mostly because you don't ever think about things like how tall they were. Thomas Jefferson was extremely tall, but then James Madison was like my height! We walked through the whole museum constantly stopping to look at the figures (many of whom were VERY lifelike). A corny moment was when I had Burke take a picture with Richard Nixon because we love Futurama and in the TV show Nixon becomes president of Earth in the 3000's. Although Burke's favorite was his photo with Ronald Reagan. My favorite was my photo with Teddy Roosevelt. We also took photos with some other people such as Johnny Depp, Bob Dylan and I got a photo of the heads of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI (again history major showing). My Dad also got a photo with Muhhamed Ali. It was a really cool experience.
After we left Madame Tussaud's, I saw a really cool Catholic Church, so I wanted to go inside. Luckily it was open. The church's name is St. Patrick's Church, apparently it used to be a parish but got so many members that they needed to rename it. It was really big and the architecture was beautiful, especially with the added benefit of the stained glass. I took some photos of it and walked around inside for a bit. Then we all headed back to the Metro where I had to say bye to my Dad (I didn't cry, although I was really sad). Then Burke and I returned home to an afternoon of laundry and homework. But this weekend was probably one of my favorite weekends here in DC because I got to spend it with some of my family at least. And I believe my Dad enjoyed it almost as much as I did.
:)
Now I only have 25 days standing between me and heading home. (I have so many places left to visit, I don't know if I'll get them all in!)
The Spy Musuem was really neat and informative, but my god there was so much stuff everywhere! We spent over an hour walking around and we may have seen 50% of it all. There were just so many nooks and crannies and everywhere held information to read or things to look at. It was neat because it progressed through history starting with early spies from around the world and ending with the new threat of cyber spies and cyber security. One quote in the museum that I really appreciated was this one from James Woosley a former CIA Director referring to the Soviet Union's collapse, "We have slain a large dragon but we now live in a jungle filled with a bewildering variety of poisonous snakes. And in many ways the dragon was easier to keep track of." After checking out the Spy Museum Gift Shop we headed toward Madame Tussaud's.
Upon entering we immediately were placed into the presidential section. It was really cool to see the "presidents" mostly because you don't ever think about things like how tall they were. Thomas Jefferson was extremely tall, but then James Madison was like my height! We walked through the whole museum constantly stopping to look at the figures (many of whom were VERY lifelike). A corny moment was when I had Burke take a picture with Richard Nixon because we love Futurama and in the TV show Nixon becomes president of Earth in the 3000's. Although Burke's favorite was his photo with Ronald Reagan. My favorite was my photo with Teddy Roosevelt. We also took photos with some other people such as Johnny Depp, Bob Dylan and I got a photo of the heads of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI (again history major showing). My Dad also got a photo with Muhhamed Ali. It was a really cool experience.
After we left Madame Tussaud's, I saw a really cool Catholic Church, so I wanted to go inside. Luckily it was open. The church's name is St. Patrick's Church, apparently it used to be a parish but got so many members that they needed to rename it. It was really big and the architecture was beautiful, especially with the added benefit of the stained glass. I took some photos of it and walked around inside for a bit. Then we all headed back to the Metro where I had to say bye to my Dad (I didn't cry, although I was really sad). Then Burke and I returned home to an afternoon of laundry and homework. But this weekend was probably one of my favorite weekends here in DC because I got to spend it with some of my family at least. And I believe my Dad enjoyed it almost as much as I did.
:)
Now I only have 25 days standing between me and heading home. (I have so many places left to visit, I don't know if I'll get them all in!)
Walking to Arlington.
On Saturday I was very excited, why you may ask, well because my Dad visited for the weekend! So in the morning I ran out and did my grocery shopping so I would have as much time as possible to spend with my Dad. (I've been missing all of my family, so a visit from my Dad was AWESOME). He arrived around 1pm and we stopped at the Marriott so he could check in and leave his backpack there. We then went to Potbelly for lunch, sandwichs are always good, Dad ended up buying a large pickle to go with his sandwich. We ate and chatted about what has been going on. Then we headed to the Metro, because I wanted to take him to the White House! We got to the White House and took some photos in front of it. Then we headed for the National Mall to see the memorials. We planned to meet up with Burke there, he had been having a lunch with a friend. By this point it was getting to be pretty hot, but I am incredibly stubborn, so we continued on. The Metro dropped us off in the middle of the National Mall and we headed toward the Washington Monument, sadly due to the earthquake last year people still aren't allowed inside the monument. So we headed toward the WWII Monument which is the next closest. By this point it was getting a lot hotter, but we had water so we continued on. We stopped to take some photos at the WWII Monument and then decided to go toward the Vietnam Memorial. We decided against getting too close to it, considering it is a black rock wall. Next stop was the Lincoln Memorial which we climbed to the top and took some photos (this time there was not scaffolding in front of Lincoln's head). By then I was really hot and tired, so I nominated that we head back to the RAF and just spend time indoors until we head out for dinner.
Burke pulled out his cell phone and told us that the nearest Metro station was Arlington. I found that hard to believe but he said it was only .73 miles away, whereas the next closest one was .83 so Arlington it was. We started walking in that direction and man was it hot, the walk there did not have a lot of shade (we had to wander to the side of the road and such to find any). I needed to stop a few times because I was getting too hot and needed to get a breeze or something before I could continue on. But we did make it to the Metro stop in one piece. It's just funny because we all walked from Washington DC to Arlington (I know they are relatively close together but when the temperature is 102 and the humidity is at 75% it seems like an eternity). Everyone else was fine and I was fine was we were done walking although apparently I was worrying my Dad because apparently my face was extremely red (due to heat, not sunburn). But we all made it to the RAF, Burke took my Dad to his room because I really needed a shower after that walking excapade. So I showered then went to Burke's room where we watched the end of Wimbleton. Then we decided to go to a restuarant in Chinatown for dinner, Asian Spice. It was nice because it was an Asian fusion place, so we all got different foods. Burke had sushi (of course because he loves it), I had a Chinese dish called Refugee Noodles, and my Dad got a Thai dish that looked to be some sort of soup that had curry in it. I tasted my Dad's dish (he claimed it was not anywhere near spicy) and it made the tip of my tongue numb for a minute so I took one piece of Burke's California Roll (with the avocado which cooled my tongue down). Dinner was really nice and we all talked about all different kinds of things, and then we went and got Rita's for dessert which was extremely refreshing because it was still rather hot outside. We then walked to the other Metro stop in Chinatown so that my Dad could see the street performers, there were only a couple out (one gentleman playing an acoustic guitar and another further down the street playing an electric guitar). It was a really fun day (even with the heat) and I was so excited to have my Dad here.
:)
Burke pulled out his cell phone and told us that the nearest Metro station was Arlington. I found that hard to believe but he said it was only .73 miles away, whereas the next closest one was .83 so Arlington it was. We started walking in that direction and man was it hot, the walk there did not have a lot of shade (we had to wander to the side of the road and such to find any). I needed to stop a few times because I was getting too hot and needed to get a breeze or something before I could continue on. But we did make it to the Metro stop in one piece. It's just funny because we all walked from Washington DC to Arlington (I know they are relatively close together but when the temperature is 102 and the humidity is at 75% it seems like an eternity). Everyone else was fine and I was fine was we were done walking although apparently I was worrying my Dad because apparently my face was extremely red (due to heat, not sunburn). But we all made it to the RAF, Burke took my Dad to his room because I really needed a shower after that walking excapade. So I showered then went to Burke's room where we watched the end of Wimbleton. Then we decided to go to a restuarant in Chinatown for dinner, Asian Spice. It was nice because it was an Asian fusion place, so we all got different foods. Burke had sushi (of course because he loves it), I had a Chinese dish called Refugee Noodles, and my Dad got a Thai dish that looked to be some sort of soup that had curry in it. I tasted my Dad's dish (he claimed it was not anywhere near spicy) and it made the tip of my tongue numb for a minute so I took one piece of Burke's California Roll (with the avocado which cooled my tongue down). Dinner was really nice and we all talked about all different kinds of things, and then we went and got Rita's for dessert which was extremely refreshing because it was still rather hot outside. We then walked to the other Metro stop in Chinatown so that my Dad could see the street performers, there were only a couple out (one gentleman playing an acoustic guitar and another further down the street playing an electric guitar). It was a really fun day (even with the heat) and I was so excited to have my Dad here.
:)
July 6th (another day off)
As my last official day off of work this past Friday was pretty nice. Burke also had off work that day so we got to spend it together. The plan was to visit the National Archives and the National Museum of Natural History again (to see what we didn't see the first time we visited). It seemed like a good plan, we left early in the morning so as to avoid the heat of the afternoon. We arrived at the National Mall and began to walk to the National Archives, we walked through the butterfly habitat garden, which was really pretty but lacking butterflies, probably because it was so hot and humid. We reached the outside of the National Archives and saw a line longer than any I have seen since our arrival here, we debated whether we wanted to wait in that line and decided against it, so I took a photo of the outside of the building, and we plan to get over there to go inside some other time.
The Natural History Museum was amazing as it always is, that could be the history major talking, haha. We explored the upper floors, including the gemstone exhibit, and Burke saw the Hope Diamond for the first time. We then went through a photography exhibit on nature, and the photographs were amazing. After that we went back in time to a time before humans and explored both the ocean life and the creatures of the land. It was pretty interesting. We also walked through an area devoted to butterflies, they even had a butterfly garden/tent thing you could enter but we did not want to pay the $7 per person to go inside, so we just looked into the window to see the butterflies. After that we headed back downstairs and made our way home to the RAF where an afternoon of video games, movies and homework were waiting.
The Natural History Museum was amazing as it always is, that could be the history major talking, haha. We explored the upper floors, including the gemstone exhibit, and Burke saw the Hope Diamond for the first time. We then went through a photography exhibit on nature, and the photographs were amazing. After that we went back in time to a time before humans and explored both the ocean life and the creatures of the land. It was pretty interesting. We also walked through an area devoted to butterflies, they even had a butterfly garden/tent thing you could enter but we did not want to pay the $7 per person to go inside, so we just looked into the window to see the butterflies. After that we headed back downstairs and made our way home to the RAF where an afternoon of video games, movies and homework were waiting.
Sunday, July 8, 2012
My Trip to the National Holocaust Museum.
So on Thursday (July 5th) I did not have to work, but my friends did, so I decided to go exploring. I have wanted to get to the Holocaust Museum for awhile now and I decided that is where I would go. The reason? Because it is a very sad place and Burke did not want to see it, so I figured it would be the appropriate day to go, because I would be by myself. I managed to find it without a problem and arrived relatively early. I then found out that I would have to wait until 11:45am to enter the permanent exhibit (where you get a story and see what happened). It was around 10:30am at this point, so I went through a couple of the smaller exhibits and then did what any sane young woman does when she has a good amount of time, I called my mother. We chatted for awhile and I told her what I was doing for the day, she was very excited about it, and I told her I would keep all the informational brochures I received so that she can see them when I return home in August.
I then entered the permanent exhibit and chose at random an identification card, for the rest of the time I was there my name was Alice Karkauerova Seelenfriedova. I was born in Czechoslovakia in 1903. I attended secondary school and graduated marrying my childhood sweetheart. Sadly in 1934 my husband died, so I moved home to live with my parents once more. In 1939 the Germans came in and imposed strict rules, I was eventually deported to Theresienstadt Ghetto in western Czechoslovakia, I spent only a few days there and was sent on another transport to Poland where I either died in a Nazi work camp or an extermination camp, no one is sure.
After going through the permanent exhibit, which was very solemn, especially the room with all of the collected shoes which were on loan from the remembrance museum in Auschwitz. Seeing all the shoes, with the amount of variety from little children's shoes to men's work shoes to ladies sandals. It was a very strong experience. I then went to the remembrance hall and lit a candle in honor of the woman I had become for a few hours. After paying my respects to the many lives that were forever cut short I returned to the RAF to complete some homework and ponder on history (as I usually end up doing, even though other people don't always follow).
One quote that really spoke to me in the exhibit was this one: "Where books are bunred in the end people will burn."
~ I thought about this quote for quite a while and I believe it to be more true than false.
I then entered the permanent exhibit and chose at random an identification card, for the rest of the time I was there my name was Alice Karkauerova Seelenfriedova. I was born in Czechoslovakia in 1903. I attended secondary school and graduated marrying my childhood sweetheart. Sadly in 1934 my husband died, so I moved home to live with my parents once more. In 1939 the Germans came in and imposed strict rules, I was eventually deported to Theresienstadt Ghetto in western Czechoslovakia, I spent only a few days there and was sent on another transport to Poland where I either died in a Nazi work camp or an extermination camp, no one is sure.
After going through the permanent exhibit, which was very solemn, especially the room with all of the collected shoes which were on loan from the remembrance museum in Auschwitz. Seeing all the shoes, with the amount of variety from little children's shoes to men's work shoes to ladies sandals. It was a very strong experience. I then went to the remembrance hall and lit a candle in honor of the woman I had become for a few hours. After paying my respects to the many lives that were forever cut short I returned to the RAF to complete some homework and ponder on history (as I usually end up doing, even though other people don't always follow).
One quote that really spoke to me in the exhibit was this one: "Where books are bunred in the end people will burn."
~ I thought about this quote for quite a while and I believe it to be more true than false.
4th of July in Washington DC.
It's been awhile I know and I'm terribly sorry for the delay although I have not had much free time to blog. Okay let's see 4th of July was absolutely amazing! The plan was to find a good spot along the parade route in the morning, and then head back to the RAF afterward to cool off before fireworks. So the group of us headed out moderately early, left here around 9:45am to get a good shady spot to sit in and watch the parade. The parade was set to begin at 11:45am. We arrived at the Metro stop closest at around 10:30am, so we still had some time to wait. Luckily Burke found us an amazing spot to sit and watch the parade, it was literally the window sill of the American History Museum. Nice and shaded, even moderately cool compared to the rest of the area. So we had some lunch and water and waited for the parade to start. It was a pretty cool parade, lots of bands from the surrounding area came out and played (I felt so bad for them to be in full uniform when the sun is out and school colors are all black, navy blue, red, green, etc. and the uniforms were all long sleeved and pants.) Hopefully they were getting enough water to stay kind of cool. I even heard the piccolos of one band which was impressive because back when I was in parades I never knew if the audience ever heard us, since the rest of the band can be so loud. The parade also had some over sized balloons being tugged around which was interesting to watch. And of course there were veterans from all the armed forces. The part I thought was the most interesting though was the section of the parade devoted to Chinese immigrants and Chinatown, they had a float all to themselves and even had a group of girls following it doing a traditional dance. It was really beautiful to watch.
Then since we were sitting in front of the American History Museum Burke and I decided to go inside and see the exhibits. It was a pretty good museum, I definitely give them points on trying to relate things back to every day life, although sometimes it got a little corny. Overall though definitely a good museum, as all the Smithsonian's are. After that we headed back to the RAF to cool down and relax. We just did a little homework and hung out and we ordered a pizza for dinner. Then at about 6:45pm we headed out to meet up with our friend named John whose work was opening up the penthouse for employees and friends to watch fireworks.
Once we arrived we spent time hanging out with a group of people all from the RAF and just chatted because as everyone should know fireworks need to be set off in the dark. The shows started around 8:45pm, but these shows were really far away. People were getting upset because they didn't believe they were going to see good fireworks, a few even suggested leaving. I convinced the group to wait a few more minutes, and I am happy I did. About 5 minutes after my suggestion HUGE fireworks started going off about 2 blocks away from us, we probably had one of the best views. It was absolutely amazing, the show lasted about 45 minutes, but it felt like a lot longer. The show was done so well too because you were constantly expecting the finale because everything was so impressive. After that we returned to the RAF which was fun because even in the family neighborhoods people were shooting off their own smaller fireworks so we got to watch them as well. July 4th in Washington DC is an experience I won't soon forget.
Then since we were sitting in front of the American History Museum Burke and I decided to go inside and see the exhibits. It was a pretty good museum, I definitely give them points on trying to relate things back to every day life, although sometimes it got a little corny. Overall though definitely a good museum, as all the Smithsonian's are. After that we headed back to the RAF to cool down and relax. We just did a little homework and hung out and we ordered a pizza for dinner. Then at about 6:45pm we headed out to meet up with our friend named John whose work was opening up the penthouse for employees and friends to watch fireworks.
Once we arrived we spent time hanging out with a group of people all from the RAF and just chatted because as everyone should know fireworks need to be set off in the dark. The shows started around 8:45pm, but these shows were really far away. People were getting upset because they didn't believe they were going to see good fireworks, a few even suggested leaving. I convinced the group to wait a few more minutes, and I am happy I did. About 5 minutes after my suggestion HUGE fireworks started going off about 2 blocks away from us, we probably had one of the best views. It was absolutely amazing, the show lasted about 45 minutes, but it felt like a lot longer. The show was done so well too because you were constantly expecting the finale because everything was so impressive. After that we returned to the RAF which was fun because even in the family neighborhoods people were shooting off their own smaller fireworks so we got to watch them as well. July 4th in Washington DC is an experience I won't soon forget.
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Adventure to the White House
As you are aware, if you read my last post this weekend I wanted to get to the White House! Granted, this was not for the tour or anything, just to see the outside and all of that stuff. Well on Saturday in mid-afternoon after an adventure to the grocery store to buy some much needed food, Burke and I headed out to find the White House. Now this should have been relatively easy considering I had directions....
So we took the Metro out to Farragut West, which the internet informed me was the closest Metro stop to the White House. This part was correct, it was the other directions that got us into trouble. We were wandering around for about 25 minutes, when we stumbled upon the National Geographic Museum, we figured, hey it's nice out and still relatively early, let's see what it's like. We went through the two exhibits they had running, one was on the Samurai culture of Japan, and the other was all about the Titanic. Both were extremely interesting and informative. We even got to see a woman perform the traditional music of Japan on a koto (also known as the Japanese Zither). Sadly in the Samurai exhibit we were not allowed to take any photos so I cannot share those with you. But on my facebook page there are some from the Titanic exhibit for those interested. After this we decided to really try and find the White House.
Yet again we ran into some trouble, we just started wandering around and passed by some cool embassies, Peru, Chile, Trinidad and Tobago, and even Uzbekistan (which Burke stepped foot in, officially....without a passport!). After this Burke was a little tired from all the walking as was I by this point, so he decided to see if his phone would give us directions. It did, and it was to the correct location so we finally found the White House. (We later discovered that my directions were like backward, instead of turning right on a street it would have us turn left.) I'm not really sure how that worked out, but oh well. We found the White House! And I got a few photos of it, and luckily it was a nice day outside so even though we were a little hot, it was not too humid.
As for today, well I'm not sure what it was, I woke up and was feeling under the weather so sadly I did not get to adventure today, which I am extremely disappointed about. Although I did do some research for a bunch of random things, and made a list of things that I want to get to here in the near future, most notably I want to get to the Chinese Embassy, so that I can "go to China" before I really go to China. Some people may call this lame, but I think it's really cool that technically by stepping onto the ground of an embassy you are in their country. Anyways that's all for now, luckily I am feeling a little better, and tomorrow I have programming. So I'll keep you all updated!
So we took the Metro out to Farragut West, which the internet informed me was the closest Metro stop to the White House. This part was correct, it was the other directions that got us into trouble. We were wandering around for about 25 minutes, when we stumbled upon the National Geographic Museum, we figured, hey it's nice out and still relatively early, let's see what it's like. We went through the two exhibits they had running, one was on the Samurai culture of Japan, and the other was all about the Titanic. Both were extremely interesting and informative. We even got to see a woman perform the traditional music of Japan on a koto (also known as the Japanese Zither). Sadly in the Samurai exhibit we were not allowed to take any photos so I cannot share those with you. But on my facebook page there are some from the Titanic exhibit for those interested. After this we decided to really try and find the White House.
Yet again we ran into some trouble, we just started wandering around and passed by some cool embassies, Peru, Chile, Trinidad and Tobago, and even Uzbekistan (which Burke stepped foot in, officially....without a passport!). After this Burke was a little tired from all the walking as was I by this point, so he decided to see if his phone would give us directions. It did, and it was to the correct location so we finally found the White House. (We later discovered that my directions were like backward, instead of turning right on a street it would have us turn left.) I'm not really sure how that worked out, but oh well. We found the White House! And I got a few photos of it, and luckily it was a nice day outside so even though we were a little hot, it was not too humid.
As for today, well I'm not sure what it was, I woke up and was feeling under the weather so sadly I did not get to adventure today, which I am extremely disappointed about. Although I did do some research for a bunch of random things, and made a list of things that I want to get to here in the near future, most notably I want to get to the Chinese Embassy, so that I can "go to China" before I really go to China. Some people may call this lame, but I think it's really cool that technically by stepping onto the ground of an embassy you are in their country. Anyways that's all for now, luckily I am feeling a little better, and tomorrow I have programming. So I'll keep you all updated!
Saturday, June 23, 2012
Work, work, work
Hello everyone, I hope you are all doing well. As you can guess from the title of this post I have not done much other than work. Now granted it's a lot of different work, work for internship, work for my class, and work for programming. Although today I should be able to get out and enjoy myself for a bit I'm going to try and see the White House, not the tour today, just take photos of the outside and such. I do plan to sign up for the actual tour, although I'm not sure when yet. I need to think about that. Anyways back to the recap of this week. Internship has been going well, I'm enjoying all the work I am doing. Yesterday I worked on changing the colors of two separate logos for six hours, now if you are wondering what took so long, it's because I had to change the color pixel by pixel in Microsoft Paint. When I went to bed last night as I closed my eyes I still saw the pixels and that red color I was changing them into. So as you can guess I was really focused on the project, considering the image was burned into my mind.
Well programming is not too stressful, it's mostly just getting all the pieces of the portfolio done on time. Luckily I do not have anything due this week. That's because this coming week I have to go learn how to make a resume and cover letter, I don't mind the cover letter part because I have never really learned that, mostly just taught myself. As for the resume, well I find that kind of redundant considering we needed a resume to apply to the Washington Center, and because I learned how to make one from my Dad. My Dad is a very successful man, I trust his judgement on how to make a resume, among other things. Yet, I will still go to the meeting for the resume thing for two reasons, one it is required to go, and two who knows I might learn something. That's all really for programming, although next Friday I get to go to the National Wheelchair Games with my civic engagement group, it's a part of programming. Everyone needs to be involved in a civic engagement group. Mine is the Veterans group, so we are volunteering with the wheelchair games because a good number of the participants are veterans. We also have had a few speakers already related to veteran stuff, one was part of the Student Veterans of America, another was a veteran who got a medical discharge and talked to us about his experiences with healthcare and the military. And we are having another woman come talk to us in a few weeks who runs a homeless shelter for female veterans.
Class is not really stressful either, mostly it's just a lot of reading. I am getting a take home midterm this coming week, which should not be too bad, I mean it's just on the reading and our class lectures. So I think that I am prepared, although I do need to finish the book, which is only about 3 more chapters. I should not have a problem finishing those before Tuesday. Other than that class is mostly group work through discussions and such. I actually enjoy the discussions though because this class is filled with people who are involved and want to learn. It is a nice change of pace, because a good percentage of the time I am the only person really excited about class and learning. Ah well it happens. Other than that not too much happened this past week, mostly just wanted to get as much done as I could so I could go out and explore again this weekend. So I am off to do some grocery shopping and then later this afternoon....the White House!
Well programming is not too stressful, it's mostly just getting all the pieces of the portfolio done on time. Luckily I do not have anything due this week. That's because this coming week I have to go learn how to make a resume and cover letter, I don't mind the cover letter part because I have never really learned that, mostly just taught myself. As for the resume, well I find that kind of redundant considering we needed a resume to apply to the Washington Center, and because I learned how to make one from my Dad. My Dad is a very successful man, I trust his judgement on how to make a resume, among other things. Yet, I will still go to the meeting for the resume thing for two reasons, one it is required to go, and two who knows I might learn something. That's all really for programming, although next Friday I get to go to the National Wheelchair Games with my civic engagement group, it's a part of programming. Everyone needs to be involved in a civic engagement group. Mine is the Veterans group, so we are volunteering with the wheelchair games because a good number of the participants are veterans. We also have had a few speakers already related to veteran stuff, one was part of the Student Veterans of America, another was a veteran who got a medical discharge and talked to us about his experiences with healthcare and the military. And we are having another woman come talk to us in a few weeks who runs a homeless shelter for female veterans.
Class is not really stressful either, mostly it's just a lot of reading. I am getting a take home midterm this coming week, which should not be too bad, I mean it's just on the reading and our class lectures. So I think that I am prepared, although I do need to finish the book, which is only about 3 more chapters. I should not have a problem finishing those before Tuesday. Other than that class is mostly group work through discussions and such. I actually enjoy the discussions though because this class is filled with people who are involved and want to learn. It is a nice change of pace, because a good percentage of the time I am the only person really excited about class and learning. Ah well it happens. Other than that not too much happened this past week, mostly just wanted to get as much done as I could so I could go out and explore again this weekend. So I am off to do some grocery shopping and then later this afternoon....the White House!
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
2nd Programming on July 11
This past Monday I had programming yet again, although before programming I got to attend a workshop called True Colors. It was a personality based test, to show you what color (out of four) you were and how you interact with people because of it. The four colors were orange, gold, blue and green. A little blurb about each - orange is an free thinker can do the work but is not stressed about deadlines and likes to be around people - gold is an organized thinker one who plans and lists just about everything and is very concerned with deadlines although does not care much for other people - blue is the very social one who will do the work, but only as long as the group dynamic is okay first - green is the analytical one preferring to work alone and analyze each piece of information as it comes along. After I took the assessment I found out that my two highest scores were gold and orange, only separated by one point. As I told the group this the woman running it was surprised because apparently orange and gold are opposites.
After that I headed to the Career Bootcamp, and got some business cards, so I'm super professional. Although they don't have my cell phone number on them. Strange. Anyways then we had to listen to a woman speak about volunteerism, it was kind of boring. Then we were told to choose from a list two events we would be interested in attending. The first one I went to was called "Negotiating Your First Salary" it was pretty informative and it was cool because the man who headed the discussion up is actually my professor for my leadership class. The second one I went to was called "A Different Bottom Line: Careers in the Non-Profit Sector" which was also informative, and something I found surprising was the best undergraduate degree to have to do work within the non-profit sector.....it was history. Haha, so I've got another option to consider. After that I just headed back with everyone else to the RAF and wrote a couple blog posts before heading to bed.
In not so happy news I also recieved a phone call from my mother saying that our dog Dutchess, had passed away. It was and still is very sad for me. But she was a wonderful dog and I loved her very much.
After that I headed to the Career Bootcamp, and got some business cards, so I'm super professional. Although they don't have my cell phone number on them. Strange. Anyways then we had to listen to a woman speak about volunteerism, it was kind of boring. Then we were told to choose from a list two events we would be interested in attending. The first one I went to was called "Negotiating Your First Salary" it was pretty informative and it was cool because the man who headed the discussion up is actually my professor for my leadership class. The second one I went to was called "A Different Bottom Line: Careers in the Non-Profit Sector" which was also informative, and something I found surprising was the best undergraduate degree to have to do work within the non-profit sector.....it was history. Haha, so I've got another option to consider. After that I just headed back with everyone else to the RAF and wrote a couple blog posts before heading to bed.
In not so happy news I also recieved a phone call from my mother saying that our dog Dutchess, had passed away. It was and still is very sad for me. But she was a wonderful dog and I loved her very much.
Monday, June 11, 2012
My Exciting Weekend
This past weekend was rather busy for me. On Saturday a group of us got together and went to the National Zoo. It was an experience. Granted I have been to a few zoos before, but this was the first zoo that had a panda!! And it was so cool because the panda was actually eating when we were there, which is surprising because I believe it's something like 18 hours a day a panda spends sleeping. Other than the panda we did see all the other animals that we could. Although it was such a hot day, like 91 degrees but we kept hydrated and managed to get through the whole zoo by about 2pm (we arrived at like 11:30ish) so luckily we finished before the hottest part of the day. After the zoo everyone came back and napped, then just hung around here for dinner and such. Burke and I walked over to a nearby Five Guys and got some burgers, it was good, although we were planning on another restuarant, but everything in the surrounding area was already closed and it was only like 7pm on a Saturday, which is strange. So Saturday was a long but very good day.
Sunday also was a busy day, because we planned to stop by the National Portrait Gallery because there was an artist there working on a piece for the Girl Scouts of America, since it is there centinial anniversary. Sadly we did not see that, although we did see plenty of girl scouts, some more interested in the gallery than others, hahaha. Anyways, we explored the Portrait Gallery and saw some incredible work. There was even an exhibit called the Art of Video Games (I think Tyler and Tommy would have appreciated it) although they may not know of the earlier video games, pre-Playstation. We explored that whole gallery/museum for a couple of hours. Then the group of us headed back to the RAF and I went to Abi's room to read over her IDP and offer advice to make it better if necessary. I had finished my own IDP Friday evening, so I was doing fine. After that I went back up to Burke's room and hung out there while I wrote a response to Dr. Ponder at Drury, for credit. Then Burke and I went to Fuddruckers for dinner, and luckily snagged a table the place was so busy. Afterwords we walked back from Chinatown to the RAF, figuring we could work off the calories we just ate. Then I came to my room, and headed to bed relatively early because Monday morning I signed up for an event called True Colors, where you learn your leadership style via a personality test.
Sunday also was a busy day, because we planned to stop by the National Portrait Gallery because there was an artist there working on a piece for the Girl Scouts of America, since it is there centinial anniversary. Sadly we did not see that, although we did see plenty of girl scouts, some more interested in the gallery than others, hahaha. Anyways, we explored the Portrait Gallery and saw some incredible work. There was even an exhibit called the Art of Video Games (I think Tyler and Tommy would have appreciated it) although they may not know of the earlier video games, pre-Playstation. We explored that whole gallery/museum for a couple of hours. Then the group of us headed back to the RAF and I went to Abi's room to read over her IDP and offer advice to make it better if necessary. I had finished my own IDP Friday evening, so I was doing fine. After that I went back up to Burke's room and hung out there while I wrote a response to Dr. Ponder at Drury, for credit. Then Burke and I went to Fuddruckers for dinner, and luckily snagged a table the place was so busy. Afterwords we walked back from Chinatown to the RAF, figuring we could work off the calories we just ate. Then I came to my room, and headed to bed relatively early because Monday morning I signed up for an event called True Colors, where you learn your leadership style via a personality test.
This Past Week
.....(Dad) so this past week was exciting and I got to do a lot at work. What I did was kind of sporadic, I was researching database options, and helping to manage all the calendars, and setting up tweets in advance, and doing research to create a sole calendar which Elizabeth my supervisor could refer to when planning on what art fairs around the country she wants to attend.
I definitely managed to keep myself busy, especially once she decided on a database she liked. I then got to transfer all the contacts into the new database, and considering I am a perfectionist I had to make sure each contact had as much relevant information as I could find. So in a list of approximately 150 contacts I went through and checked each one individually. I am quite proud of myself for doing it.
I also had my class on Tuesday evening which was really exciting. Learned about some of the early theories surrounding leadership. I get to learn more tomorrow night and I have started reading the book for the class, and I am already absorbed into it. The title is The Leadership Challenge, it's written by a few gentlemen named James Kouzes and Barry Posner. And for those of you who really want to know it's the fourth edition of the book. Apparently that means it is much closer to the length of the first edition, but has the added details of being more worldy, instead of focused on just American leaders.
Other than that the week was pretty tame, just tried to get all the homework, and work done. Although I did get to work from home on Friday because Elizabeth was feeling under the weather and did not want me to get sick. So while I was working I managed to get all my laundry done, which was a nice bonus.
:)
I definitely managed to keep myself busy, especially once she decided on a database she liked. I then got to transfer all the contacts into the new database, and considering I am a perfectionist I had to make sure each contact had as much relevant information as I could find. So in a list of approximately 150 contacts I went through and checked each one individually. I am quite proud of myself for doing it.
I also had my class on Tuesday evening which was really exciting. Learned about some of the early theories surrounding leadership. I get to learn more tomorrow night and I have started reading the book for the class, and I am already absorbed into it. The title is The Leadership Challenge, it's written by a few gentlemen named James Kouzes and Barry Posner. And for those of you who really want to know it's the fourth edition of the book. Apparently that means it is much closer to the length of the first edition, but has the added details of being more worldy, instead of focused on just American leaders.
Other than that the week was pretty tame, just tried to get all the homework, and work done. Although I did get to work from home on Friday because Elizabeth was feeling under the weather and did not want me to get sick. So while I was working I managed to get all my laundry done, which was a nice bonus.
:)
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
First Real Day of Work
Okay so as everyone knows already I began working at my internship this past Friday, but I did not do much other than some basic paperwork. Yesterday was actually my first day of working. And I can honestly say I was so excited about it! Through the day I did some organizational stuff which included creating a calendar online to list all the openings of new gallery shows, pre-writing tweets to be sent out (the tweets were for Artists of the Day), writing a list to keep track of which artists we used for artist of the day, and then updating the four calendars for the online audience (events, openings, talks, and closings). Today if I have time I will see if I can add more to the events calendar because right now it is kind of bare. After completing those calendars I took my lunch break and chatted with the other intern Maddie. She's really nice, she is from California but attends American University here in DC. After our lunch break we headed back to work, and Elizabeth returned from a lunch meeting so we updated her on all we had accomplished, by this point it was 2:30 and time for Maddie to leave. Since I only had 30 minutes left to work I did some covert research on a new possible competitor. I cannot give out many details, but let's just say that it does seem like this entity will be a competitor, and that I found out much information on the internet. I think this is because I am so good at using the internet to find just about anything people have put online. Even when people are more covert I can find them given enough time. Then I headed home for the day.
Once home, I changed into more comfortable clothes and ran to the grocery store to pick up some bread and bandaids (my feet haven't fully healed yet). Then I came back to the RAF and wrote some blog posts before dinner. I then ate a wonderful dinner of ramen and water before heading down to my class. Class was interesting last night, but mostly lecture based, we learned some of the theories on leadership and did some more activities to see what leadership style we prefer the most. My highest score was in participative, then delegative and then authorative. Although I will admit the scores were all within 5 points of each other. So I would say that I am pretty well rounded when it comes to leadership styles, in the sense that I know when a situation calls for a certain style it is more useful to use that than to just fall back on another. Anyways that is really all that happened last night, now I'm just getting ready to head to my internship at 9:30 to be there by 10:15am, so I will write again when something happens!
Once home, I changed into more comfortable clothes and ran to the grocery store to pick up some bread and bandaids (my feet haven't fully healed yet). Then I came back to the RAF and wrote some blog posts before dinner. I then ate a wonderful dinner of ramen and water before heading down to my class. Class was interesting last night, but mostly lecture based, we learned some of the theories on leadership and did some more activities to see what leadership style we prefer the most. My highest score was in participative, then delegative and then authorative. Although I will admit the scores were all within 5 points of each other. So I would say that I am pretty well rounded when it comes to leadership styles, in the sense that I know when a situation calls for a certain style it is more useful to use that than to just fall back on another. Anyways that is really all that happened last night, now I'm just getting ready to head to my internship at 9:30 to be there by 10:15am, so I will write again when something happens!
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
First Programming!
Okay so yesterday I had my first ever programming, which I'm still not sure how to adequately define. But yesterday morning was uneventful because I do not work on Mondays so I just slept in and then did some laundry before lunch. After lunch Tina, Abi, AJ, and I left to head to our programming which was meeting at a company called City Year. It's about 45 minutes away from our place with a few Metro stops in between. And we did get a little turned around walking there, but since we were so early it didn't really matter.
We got there and sat down to hear Sam Neely a young woman who works at City Year tell us what it is all about. It actually sounds like a pretty cool program. Basically it has a corps of individuals who then lead, mentor and tutor at risk students in different communities in the United States. The program offers a living stipend which is based on which location you work at. And the program itself runs for the whole school year 10 months. It seems like a really rewarding program, one I might immerse myself in following graduation, who knows?
After her talk about City Year we learned about different leadership styles. She referred to it as the leadership compass. North - Action, South - Empathy, East - Vision, West - Analysis. We then divided up into the four groups and everyone chose which direction they believed best embodied their leadership style. Mine....North. We then discussed the positives and negatives of our group, and what ways other groups could work better with us. After this the groups counted off in numbers from 1-4. Then Sam told us to move to the direction we believed we were the weakest in. I of course moved to the South. We then discussed how we could work to become better leaders in these areas. After this the numbers from earlier grouped together. Each group was then given the task to build a tower. There were restraints though. North people could not touch anything. East people could not see anything. West people could not say anything. And people from the South could to anything. Honestly I hated not being able to touch anything, but it did teach me some things. I noticed that I paid a lot more attention to everyone in the group. Especially the West people because they could not talk so I helped to convey their messages. I also tried to keep the East people involved by telling them what was going on. Our group did not win the tower building exercise because we ran out of time. 30 more seconds and we would have had our last support in, but oh well. I did take away some new ideas about leadership from that. And then we were released to go explore Dupont Circle if we wanted or just to return home to the RAF (which most of us did, to get some food and possibly a nap).
We got there and sat down to hear Sam Neely a young woman who works at City Year tell us what it is all about. It actually sounds like a pretty cool program. Basically it has a corps of individuals who then lead, mentor and tutor at risk students in different communities in the United States. The program offers a living stipend which is based on which location you work at. And the program itself runs for the whole school year 10 months. It seems like a really rewarding program, one I might immerse myself in following graduation, who knows?
After her talk about City Year we learned about different leadership styles. She referred to it as the leadership compass. North - Action, South - Empathy, East - Vision, West - Analysis. We then divided up into the four groups and everyone chose which direction they believed best embodied their leadership style. Mine....North. We then discussed the positives and negatives of our group, and what ways other groups could work better with us. After this the groups counted off in numbers from 1-4. Then Sam told us to move to the direction we believed we were the weakest in. I of course moved to the South. We then discussed how we could work to become better leaders in these areas. After this the numbers from earlier grouped together. Each group was then given the task to build a tower. There were restraints though. North people could not touch anything. East people could not see anything. West people could not say anything. And people from the South could to anything. Honestly I hated not being able to touch anything, but it did teach me some things. I noticed that I paid a lot more attention to everyone in the group. Especially the West people because they could not talk so I helped to convey their messages. I also tried to keep the East people involved by telling them what was going on. Our group did not win the tower building exercise because we ran out of time. 30 more seconds and we would have had our last support in, but oh well. I did take away some new ideas about leadership from that. And then we were released to go explore Dupont Circle if we wanted or just to return home to the RAF (which most of us did, to get some food and possibly a nap).
Weekend Adventures
Okay everyone sorry I have been lax on the postings, I have three to give you to. So this is the first, just a general update about my weeked. Friday evening was rather nasty, we even had a tornado warning. It was rather serious, which I found unexpected, considering I did leave Tornado Alley. To avoid worrying my mother and because it was raining I just stayed in and hung out with Abi and a few other friends in her room and chatted.
Saturday, well I was rather tired, so I spent the morning doing some homework for my program, and organizing papers to make sure that I had everything I needed. Mostly it was just writing a reflection on my first week and a half of living in DC and the new opportunities that I can get. Once I completed that I finished Part 1 of my IDP (Individual Development Plan) which is a fancy way of saying what I hope to get from this program and internship. Later in the afternoon I spent time with Burke and played some video games.
As for Sunday, well a group of us got together to explore Chinatown. Abi and Tina had never been out there yet so we figured it would be a good opportunity. We took the Metro out there which is a quick ride, only two stops between ours and Chinatown. Anyways we decided to get lunch at a Chinese restaurant because Abi had never had Chinese food before. We chose a place called Tony Cheng's. Apparently it's rather famous because the restaurant had a wall of photos of rather famous people, although they were all older, the one I recognized was Bill Clinton. After lunch we wandered around a little bit, and then got a quick Rita's again because Abi has never had it, and we figured it would be a good dessert for her since she is lactose intolerant. Following a long day of walking we returned to the RAF and all went to our rooms respectively to get some rest in before Monday and our first programming.
Saturday, well I was rather tired, so I spent the morning doing some homework for my program, and organizing papers to make sure that I had everything I needed. Mostly it was just writing a reflection on my first week and a half of living in DC and the new opportunities that I can get. Once I completed that I finished Part 1 of my IDP (Individual Development Plan) which is a fancy way of saying what I hope to get from this program and internship. Later in the afternoon I spent time with Burke and played some video games.
As for Sunday, well a group of us got together to explore Chinatown. Abi and Tina had never been out there yet so we figured it would be a good opportunity. We took the Metro out there which is a quick ride, only two stops between ours and Chinatown. Anyways we decided to get lunch at a Chinese restaurant because Abi had never had Chinese food before. We chose a place called Tony Cheng's. Apparently it's rather famous because the restaurant had a wall of photos of rather famous people, although they were all older, the one I recognized was Bill Clinton. After lunch we wandered around a little bit, and then got a quick Rita's again because Abi has never had it, and we figured it would be a good dessert for her since she is lactose intolerant. Following a long day of walking we returned to the RAF and all went to our rooms respectively to get some rest in before Monday and our first programming.
Friday, June 1, 2012
First Day of Internship!
Okay well today was interesting to say the least. First of all I managed to show up to my internship two hours early. Apparently I had forgotten the part of an email she sent me where she said to come at noon and not 10am. Oh well it ended up working out. I did some basic paperwork and she gave me a run down of what I will be hopefully accomplishing this summer. It seems like I will be very busy, and I can honestly stay that I am thrilled. Mostly because I would rather have too many things going on than to have a whole lot of free time. When I have too much free time I do not know what to do with myself.
Specifically as far as my tasks are concerned I will be creating the monthly newsletter, managing all of the multiple calendars that are necessary, making sure the bloggers are prepared and have topics, helping manage all of the paperwork necessary if my supervisor was ever to sell her business, and to help expand upon different aspects of the website along with social media. I really cannot wait to begin everything, it all sounds like things right up my alley.
:)
That's all for now, tomorrow I will be exploring Chinatown in hopes of locating some underground art scenes to report back to my supervisor.
Specifically as far as my tasks are concerned I will be creating the monthly newsletter, managing all of the multiple calendars that are necessary, making sure the bloggers are prepared and have topics, helping manage all of the paperwork necessary if my supervisor was ever to sell her business, and to help expand upon different aspects of the website along with social media. I really cannot wait to begin everything, it all sounds like things right up my alley.
:)
That's all for now, tomorrow I will be exploring Chinatown in hopes of locating some underground art scenes to report back to my supervisor.
Sunday, May 27, 2012
What has already happened.
Okay let's start from the beginning of my arrival. The plane Burke and I were on from Dallas landed in Washington Reagan airport at approximately 3:50pm (EST) on Wednesday, then we walked to baggage claim and found our luggage. (sidenote: I did not realize how hard it would be to walk with two huge rolling pieces of luggage). We then checked in at the SuperShuttle desk, ended up waiting about 25 minutes until our shuttle arrived. The drive to our new home was pretty uneventful except that it was about 40 minutes. Upon entering the building a young woman told us to leave our luggage in the entryway and go downstairs to pick up our keys by this point it was about 5:05pm (EST). The reason the times matter so much is because we had not had any dinner and had to get to a mandatory meeting at 7pm (EST), which would not have food at it, and was scheduled to last until 9pm (EST).
We returned to the entryway and went up to our rooms, mine is room 505, thank god this building has elevators because I was NOT carrying all my luggage up 5 flights of stairs. So I arrive in my room, none of my roommates were there when I walked in. Although all of them had previously arrived. I claimed the last bed, which is in the "master" bedroom and has a window at the head of the bed. I proceeded to speed unpack, and was wondering what and if Burke and I would be eating dinner. I then got a text from Burke saying that his roommate AJ was getting chinese food and if I wanted any. I of course said yes. I finished unpacking everything at around 6:30, and walked down to Burke's room. Luckily the chinese food arrived at about 6:45pm. We all ate as much as we could as fast as we could. We ate until about 6:57pm, and rushed downstairs to the meeting. I can honestly say that the first 45 minutes of the meeting were useful, the rest was either obvious information or stuff that could be found on the Washington Center's website. Hense by this point I was very tired and still rather hungry. Luckily the meeting ended pretty quickly at about 9:15pm. Burke and I returned to his room, ate some more chinese food and then I left to head to bed although I had to take my chinese with me so that I would have something for breakfast because I still had not had time to get to the grocery store.
Thursday was pretty busy, although we had a little more free time. We both spent the day with our programs respectively. In the morning my program met and our program advisor (Josh Bartell) gave us a rundown on what the summer would entail as far as the different requirements. We got out of the meeting at about 11:45am, and had an hour to eat lunch before we headed out with our program groups to tours which related to our programs. Again I did not have time to get groceries so luckily one of my roommates let me eat a bowl of cereal. The tour in the afternoon was the John F. Kennedy Center for Performing Arts. It was an informative tour, and I have some photos I took up on facebook from it. That ended around 3:30, so I returned to the RAF (Residential Academic Facility) [where I live] put down my stuff and headed out with Burke to finally pick up some groceries.
Finding the grocery store was an adventure in itself, you see I had printed directions and did know the address. Although we ended up walking right by the building because the sign with the name on it was pretty high up, and as you all are aware I am not noted for being tall. So we walked around wondering where it was and luckily saw the CVS which is right across the street from it. So we picked up all the necessary food items, figuring that we would get the non-urgent stuff either on Friday or during the weekend. For dinner we went to this Italian place right across the street from the RAF. It's called Zuppa Fresca, it was a very nice environment, and not expensive for the portion sizes, although it did take about 40 minutes for our food to come out. But the taste definitely made up for it. Afterword we returned to the RAF and at 8pm went downstairs to the Ice cream Golf Social, and yes that is what it was called. Although oddly enough their idea of golf was that each table with ice cream was a 'hole'. I teamed up with a girl named Abi, she's from Gloucester, Massachusetts. She is lactose intolerant, so I offered to be her taste tester. There were nine holes in all, and I did try each one, again facebook has proof of this. She's really nice and we've been hanging out a lot, with a group of people. After the ice cream social I headed up to my room and all of the girls wanted to complete our roommate agreement form. Luckily we're all rather similar. The other girls are as follows Jacque (pronounced Jackie) who is my roommate, Emily and Caitlin. Jacque is from Ohio and is a psychology major. I don't remember where Emily and Caitlin are from. But we ended up completing our roommate agreement, and then headed to bed.
Friday was a busier day because we had to be up and at the meeting place by 8:45am so I got up earlier. We had a small group and we all headed out on the Metro to get to our destination. The attire for the day was business professional so I wore a nice blouse with slacks and some short black pumps. In the morning it was all required meetings in a large auditorium. I sat with Abi and two other girls I met Tina and Miki. The meetings were more useful this time around and after those were finished we each got to sign up for a civic engagement project, I signed up to be part of the Veterans one, but it is first come first serve, so I am not 100% sure whether I'll get in or not. Although it would be really interesting and the service day for them is to work the 32nd annual National Wheelchair Olympics which would be a cool experience. After the morning meetings we got together with a group which started out as only 6 people but ended up being 14 for lunch. We went to a place called Zentan, it's a sushi restaurant which also has other offerings (lucky for some of the guys they even serve a burger). After lunch some people went back to the meeting building for the afternoon question sessions although most of us just wanted to return to the RAF. My feet were killing me by this point and I knew I had at least 2 blisters. Well when we got home I limped up to my room and began my investigation, and upon reviewing the situation, it turned out that I had 9 blisters, and was in quite a bit of pain. I have since remedied the situation and they are all slowly healing. For dinner Burke and I just wanted to stay in so we made some ramen and watched Futurama.
Saturday morning was just a simple morning doing some organizing and a quick run to the grocery store with Burke to get a few things like laundry detergent. After lunch a group of us (me, Burke, Abi, Ryan, Andrew, Matt, Daquan, and Shanece) all decided we wanted to get out and explore. So we took the Metro to the Smithsonian stop and decided to go into a few of the museums. It was a lot of fun, although it was a little hot. First we went into the Freer Gallery which had a lot of Asian art, from early Chinese art, to Japanese, Indian and even Middle Eastern art. It was rather interesting to see it all. Then we just headed down the road stopping at a few places (Smithsonian Castle, sculpture garden) and eventually ended up inside of the Air and Space Museum. It was really busy in that one, but I mean it is Memorial Weekend. So we didn't stay too long in there, but did see the important stuff, like the Apollo exhibit. After that one the group was really tired so we decided that the last museum would be the Museum of Natural History. We got to the museum and looked around for awhile, eventually ending at the whale exhibits. Abi has volunteered on a whale watch for eleven years so she was telling all of us all kinds of information on whales, it was pretty cool.
After we returned from our Smithsonian visit we just all went back to our rooms to rest following the busy day we had. I personally took a nap and man did I need it. For dinner that night Burke, Matt and I decided to go to a burger place, we decided on Five Guys Burgers and Fries. We began to walk to our destination and found out that it was located in almost the heart of Chinatown. That was really cool to see because all the signs are in English and Mandarin (a good opportunity for practice!). While walking to our choice for dinner I saw a place....RITA'S ITALIAN ICE!!! I was so excited because I have told Burke about it before but he has never had it. I told the guys that after dinner we had to stop there and get some Italian ice. We got to Five Guys and each had burgers respectively, afterword we walked back toward the Rita's and got some Italian ice (Burke had cherry, Matt and I both wanted the Swedish fish flavor). We then wandered Chinatown for a little while and came across a street band, which was really impressive to watch, especially the younger kid because he had the solos and was really good. After that we headed back to the RAF and hung out in Abi's room with the rest of the group. Once it got later everyone decided to head to bed.
We returned to the entryway and went up to our rooms, mine is room 505, thank god this building has elevators because I was NOT carrying all my luggage up 5 flights of stairs. So I arrive in my room, none of my roommates were there when I walked in. Although all of them had previously arrived. I claimed the last bed, which is in the "master" bedroom and has a window at the head of the bed. I proceeded to speed unpack, and was wondering what and if Burke and I would be eating dinner. I then got a text from Burke saying that his roommate AJ was getting chinese food and if I wanted any. I of course said yes. I finished unpacking everything at around 6:30, and walked down to Burke's room. Luckily the chinese food arrived at about 6:45pm. We all ate as much as we could as fast as we could. We ate until about 6:57pm, and rushed downstairs to the meeting. I can honestly say that the first 45 minutes of the meeting were useful, the rest was either obvious information or stuff that could be found on the Washington Center's website. Hense by this point I was very tired and still rather hungry. Luckily the meeting ended pretty quickly at about 9:15pm. Burke and I returned to his room, ate some more chinese food and then I left to head to bed although I had to take my chinese with me so that I would have something for breakfast because I still had not had time to get to the grocery store.
Thursday was pretty busy, although we had a little more free time. We both spent the day with our programs respectively. In the morning my program met and our program advisor (Josh Bartell) gave us a rundown on what the summer would entail as far as the different requirements. We got out of the meeting at about 11:45am, and had an hour to eat lunch before we headed out with our program groups to tours which related to our programs. Again I did not have time to get groceries so luckily one of my roommates let me eat a bowl of cereal. The tour in the afternoon was the John F. Kennedy Center for Performing Arts. It was an informative tour, and I have some photos I took up on facebook from it. That ended around 3:30, so I returned to the RAF (Residential Academic Facility) [where I live] put down my stuff and headed out with Burke to finally pick up some groceries.
Finding the grocery store was an adventure in itself, you see I had printed directions and did know the address. Although we ended up walking right by the building because the sign with the name on it was pretty high up, and as you all are aware I am not noted for being tall. So we walked around wondering where it was and luckily saw the CVS which is right across the street from it. So we picked up all the necessary food items, figuring that we would get the non-urgent stuff either on Friday or during the weekend. For dinner we went to this Italian place right across the street from the RAF. It's called Zuppa Fresca, it was a very nice environment, and not expensive for the portion sizes, although it did take about 40 minutes for our food to come out. But the taste definitely made up for it. Afterword we returned to the RAF and at 8pm went downstairs to the Ice cream Golf Social, and yes that is what it was called. Although oddly enough their idea of golf was that each table with ice cream was a 'hole'. I teamed up with a girl named Abi, she's from Gloucester, Massachusetts. She is lactose intolerant, so I offered to be her taste tester. There were nine holes in all, and I did try each one, again facebook has proof of this. She's really nice and we've been hanging out a lot, with a group of people. After the ice cream social I headed up to my room and all of the girls wanted to complete our roommate agreement form. Luckily we're all rather similar. The other girls are as follows Jacque (pronounced Jackie) who is my roommate, Emily and Caitlin. Jacque is from Ohio and is a psychology major. I don't remember where Emily and Caitlin are from. But we ended up completing our roommate agreement, and then headed to bed.
Friday was a busier day because we had to be up and at the meeting place by 8:45am so I got up earlier. We had a small group and we all headed out on the Metro to get to our destination. The attire for the day was business professional so I wore a nice blouse with slacks and some short black pumps. In the morning it was all required meetings in a large auditorium. I sat with Abi and two other girls I met Tina and Miki. The meetings were more useful this time around and after those were finished we each got to sign up for a civic engagement project, I signed up to be part of the Veterans one, but it is first come first serve, so I am not 100% sure whether I'll get in or not. Although it would be really interesting and the service day for them is to work the 32nd annual National Wheelchair Olympics which would be a cool experience. After the morning meetings we got together with a group which started out as only 6 people but ended up being 14 for lunch. We went to a place called Zentan, it's a sushi restaurant which also has other offerings (lucky for some of the guys they even serve a burger). After lunch some people went back to the meeting building for the afternoon question sessions although most of us just wanted to return to the RAF. My feet were killing me by this point and I knew I had at least 2 blisters. Well when we got home I limped up to my room and began my investigation, and upon reviewing the situation, it turned out that I had 9 blisters, and was in quite a bit of pain. I have since remedied the situation and they are all slowly healing. For dinner Burke and I just wanted to stay in so we made some ramen and watched Futurama.
Saturday morning was just a simple morning doing some organizing and a quick run to the grocery store with Burke to get a few things like laundry detergent. After lunch a group of us (me, Burke, Abi, Ryan, Andrew, Matt, Daquan, and Shanece) all decided we wanted to get out and explore. So we took the Metro to the Smithsonian stop and decided to go into a few of the museums. It was a lot of fun, although it was a little hot. First we went into the Freer Gallery which had a lot of Asian art, from early Chinese art, to Japanese, Indian and even Middle Eastern art. It was rather interesting to see it all. Then we just headed down the road stopping at a few places (Smithsonian Castle, sculpture garden) and eventually ended up inside of the Air and Space Museum. It was really busy in that one, but I mean it is Memorial Weekend. So we didn't stay too long in there, but did see the important stuff, like the Apollo exhibit. After that one the group was really tired so we decided that the last museum would be the Museum of Natural History. We got to the museum and looked around for awhile, eventually ending at the whale exhibits. Abi has volunteered on a whale watch for eleven years so she was telling all of us all kinds of information on whales, it was pretty cool.
After we returned from our Smithsonian visit we just all went back to our rooms to rest following the busy day we had. I personally took a nap and man did I need it. For dinner that night Burke, Matt and I decided to go to a burger place, we decided on Five Guys Burgers and Fries. We began to walk to our destination and found out that it was located in almost the heart of Chinatown. That was really cool to see because all the signs are in English and Mandarin (a good opportunity for practice!). While walking to our choice for dinner I saw a place....RITA'S ITALIAN ICE!!! I was so excited because I have told Burke about it before but he has never had it. I told the guys that after dinner we had to stop there and get some Italian ice. We got to Five Guys and each had burgers respectively, afterword we walked back toward the Rita's and got some Italian ice (Burke had cherry, Matt and I both wanted the Swedish fish flavor). We then wandered Chinatown for a little while and came across a street band, which was really impressive to watch, especially the younger kid because he had the solos and was really good. After that we headed back to the RAF and hung out in Abi's room with the rest of the group. Once it got later everyone decided to head to bed.
First Post!
Okay well hello everyone. This is my blog for the summer, to keep everyone somewhat up to date on what is going on in Washington DC. I am not sure how regularly I will post about what is going on, I will post at least once a week, sometimes more depending on how much free time I have. As far as photos I'm not sure if I will be putting them up on here, I figure they will just be on facebook. Also the next few posts I'm hoping to get in, will be from when I arrived this past Wednesday until now, so that anyone who didn't get earlier updates will be up to date. As for now I'm off to the grocery store to pick up some food, a group of us are having a potluck dinner of sorts tonight (pasta, salad, bread, etc.) and I'm out to get a good amount of Ceasar salad.
Zaijian!
Zaijian!
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