It feels like a dream
So, my flight from Washington D.C. to Miami has been delayed by an hour so I am here again. I just finish posting most of my pictures in Facebook, and now it's time for this blog. To start off, I must say I really like Washington DC. It is literally on the top list of my favorite vacations. I feel like I have been very lucky during the few days I have been here, and I am very thankful for everything that has taken place - including the times when I didn't have to wait for the bus/traffic lights, I'm just thankful for it all. People here are really nice and friendly, and they are so helpful. The city is clean and the air is fresh. Even the weather has been kind to me. It did not rain a single time, and it wasn't even exactly cold. Food has been great, service even better and just about everything seemed to make me like this place more and more. If I have the chance in the future, I definitely want to come back here again. There is still so much I feel like I have not had the chance to see during my short visit here.As I had mentioned in the previous post, my bus had been delayed and I ended up arriving in the night instead of my planned morning. I lost the entire day that day, but it wasn't too bad. The bus I took after that had really nice staff who helped me through the transfers along the way. It was comfortable and not too packed which was a good thing considering all the stuff I was lunging along. Unfortunately, I lost my travel pillow when I was getting between the station and the bus stop to my hostel. I do in part regret not taking my bigger luggage because that one has wheels, but I guess I'll manage. So by the time I checked in and got everything settled down, it was already about 10pm. I went down to the common area after that and got talking to one of the other guests there. He was from San Francisco, named George. We got to talking and he gave me some ideas on where to stay or how to get around. It was quite interesting. Traveling with my parents never gave me this opportunity to talk with "strangers" and it seemed a little new to me at the start, but it's really interesting how nice people actually are.
We were searching for our own places to stay on our vacation. He was heading up to NYC, and I was looking for places in New Mexico and Los Angeles. I went to bed at about 1am, not really knowing what to expect of this city the coming day. Considering that Washington is the capital, I had initially thought that it would be similar to NYC. Honestly, NYC has some perks, but its not a city for me. It is loud, noisy, crowded, there is litter just about everywhere and everyone is rushing somewhere. Washington is very much different from NYC. If you look just slightly lost, people would stop and guide you along. Some would greet you a Merry Christmas along the way, etc.
I left the hostel later than I had planned to at about 10am but all was good. That's the good thing about travelling alone, you do whatever the hell you want to as long as you have the discipline to get out of the place you are staying in - if not, it defeats the whole purpose of travelling.
Where else better to start my experience in Washington DC apart from the White House?
So, my first destination was exactly that. I took the metro down to Farragut West, and had brunch at Teaism. I had a pot of Lapsung Souchong Black Tea and a bowl of Curry Lentil soup. That warmed me right up before I started to walk towards the White House.
I don't know how the crowd usually is, but I consider myself really lucky that there was absolutely no crowd at all. I guess it is because my school's finals are earlier than most schools, and I left immediately after my finals ended so the whole holiday hasn't started for others just yet.
And tada! This is the famous White House. I took many other pictures of it further in my trip, so expect to see more of it.
I walked down towards the right where the next building was the department of treasury. Basically everything of touristic interest are mostly in this area which was very convenient.
The W Hotel. I actually never knew that W = Washington?
The next famous stop - the Washington Monument.
Did you know that the Washington monument actually has 2 colors? The marble was from different quarries and they reacted differently to the wind and the rain, causing the bottom portion to look more white than the top.
That is the Smithsonian of Natural History which I went to on my third day in Washington. It's really amazing but more to that next time.
Here comes another thing I am thankful for that day. I honestly felt so lucky during this trip. So, I actually didn't know that we could go up the monument nor that there were tickets for such a thing. So when I arrived there, I read the whole ticket thing (it is free) but we actually were supposed to go somewhere else to collect them. I so happened to be there when the security guard there had 4 extra tickets because someone else handed them to him, so I didn't have to go through the whole process of going to collect the tickets elsewhere.
The Lincoln Memorial and Reflecting Pool
The Capitol
The tickets I collected directly from the guard.
Entering the monument was a tiring process. Everything around here seems to be very stringently checked and rightly so. Every museum you enter requires a bag check and going through the whole body scan thing.
We rode the elevator up to the top, and that took us 70+ seconds as the lady controlling the elevator told us.
The Tidal Basin, as the next picture explains and depicts.
The Lincoln Memorial and Reflecting Pool once again
The White House and the Eclipse
The Capitol
When my parents first came to Washington DC, they mistook the Capitol for the white house. That was when that sent my brother off to school in Geneseo.
Next, I went to visit the Holocaust Memorial Museum.
It is an amazing museum, one of my favorites I must say. It really hits the heart. It's an emotional museum where you start to think what life was like during the Nazi domination, how it was like living as a Jew during that time. I say it's a must-see in Washington.
The information guy was very helpful, and he guided me on how to go about looking through the museum.
The first portion I went to was how life was like as a Jewish child during the Nazi's control.
It was depicted like a diary, how things changed. There were pictures of the before and after, how their lifestyles changed, how they had to move into Ghettos, etc.
Doctors who served the Jews were arrested, bakeries were not allowed to sell to Jews, they were only allowed to buy from certain stores and eventually all they could get was tapioca.
After that, I went to the permanent exhibition, Apparently photography was not allowed there so I couldn't get much. They had many exhibits, explaining what happened in concentration camps, death marches, poison chambers, they even had doctors who experimented on the jews to serve the german soldiers.
I guess, when you leave this place, you start to think about how lucky you are to live freely like this. To top the sweet cake with a cherry, I walked out just in time to watch the sunset.
I headed down to the Lincoln Memorial and Reflecting Pool
Once again, probably because of the timing, there wasn't much of a crowd. I literally went in, snapped pictures and left without waiting whatsoever.
I started walking down to the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and kinda got a little lost. Apparently, you can only enter the place through one road and I tried to cut through another.
I went to the left from here, where you can actually see the centre but apparently can't go through. A guard saw me which he was lowering the flag and guided me around the other way.
I arrived at the center at about 5.45pm. It looks dark and later than it actually is, only because it's winter.
Once again, I was extremely lucky. I was exploring the place on my own and I chanced upon free performances at 6 pm. When I arrived at that hall, it was approximately 5.50pm. I even managed to get a relatively good seat and got to watch a preview of the Little Prince followed by some christmas carols.
After the performance, it was about 7pm, and I headed down to Georgetown to get their famous cupcakes. I went to Sprinkles first (pictures next time) and then to Baked and Wired. Sprinkles looks like a buy and go place, but Baked and Wired had music playing, and seats around. it was really lively.
There was this santa displayed in Baked and Wired. The picture was blurred because I was carrying alot of things after buying 3 cupcakes from Sprinkles and another 4 from Baked and Wired, plus a Spinach and Peta Quiche as well as my camera bag and my other bag. Anyway, the sign writes: I watch you while you sleep.
It is really cute how they display all their cakes in little jars like these.
This is the red velvet from Sprinkles.
That concluded my tour for the first day and I'm just in time because the announcement has just been made for my flight's first class to board. I should be boarding soon. So till next time, Ciaos!
Labels: appreciation, baked and wired, holocaust, john f. kennedy center for performing arts, lincoln memorial, museum, Pictures, sprinkles, travel, USA, washington dc, washington monument, white house, winter break
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