Blogs from Washington, District of Columbia, United States, North America

Time to have finally visited the capital of the United States of America. First things first, I woke up as the bus was driving through Virginia. I actually seemed to have had a good sleep this time. I wasn't too tired. Virginia was beautiful. Once again, orange, red, yellow and green-leaved trees along the highway. We were approaching Richmond, our one change before Washington DC. I got there two and a half hours later, and found my way to the hostel easily. It was slightly chilly here, but not enough to need a jumper. I settled into me new place, where I met my roommate, who was Aussie, and had a story. He's been travelling a lot, like myself, and has been working in South Africa. After our little chat, I headed out to buy some ... read more

Since I last wrote many things have changed 1) The House of Representatives has a new majority with the GOP. Whether this will bring increased cooperation between the two parties as historically shown or become a self-fulfilling prophecy of stagnated decisions, only time will tell. Being in the nation’s capital where all these changes will take place is such a strange feeling as I know so many things will change in DC. 2) My halloween costume from two years ago became an embodiment of a little less known Christine O'Donnell event. I wore the costume proudly. http://gawker.com/5674353/i-had-a-one+night-stand-with-christine-odonnell 2) I have a new place to live. I am still in Chinatown but about four blocks close to the heart of the action. I have two great roommates, Jeff and Lynne, and I occupy the sunroom. The room ... read more

Right? It’s always funny how much time goes by between writing blog posts. It’s the classic phenomena of feeling like it was a short yet long amount of time between events. So since I last wrote, it has felt like months and hours. The main things I’ve been focused on are my internships, working at the hostel, looking for other jobs and places to live, and making friends. My internship has also been paradoxical, busy and yet not. We accomplish a lot of work but it feels very slow and I don’t necessarily feel like I’m doing a good job. I have two main projects. One is working on researching and writing a proposal about the role of religious groups on post-conflict development/reconstruction and their interaction with political parties. Apparently this issue hasn’t been studied very ... read more

I have been learning so much during my 2 weeks here. It’s election time which has been very enlightening on the political situation of DC. Apparently there are no representatives with voting power in the House or Senate which creates a unique situation for our government capital. Other things I’ve learnt about DC are the different neighborhoods and people inhabiting the district. Although normally not a runner, I have been really into running around the magnificent places in DC. I recently expanded my run from Union Station, the Capitol Building and Washington Monument to include the Whitehouse, Lincoln, WWII, and Korean War memorials. Running has become a metaphor for my transition in DC- a completely different mental and physical state than I’m used to. I’ve realized that each of us has hidden capacity to accomplish things ... read more

Whoa whoa whoa whatta week! I can’t believe that only seven days ago I was in Seattle with my family saying goodbye. It has felt like I have been living in DC for year. Maybe it is because my first week in DC has been really enjoyable or that a vast amount of learning about DC, my internship and my new job has occurred. Or maybe it’s because a week ago I had no internship or job and not even a place to live. How much has changed. I started my journey at 8:30 am on Saturday the 4th. My parents dropped me off at the airport and after waving goodbye to them at security I waited for my plane to come. The ride was very bumpy and upset my delicate stomach reactors that hate motion ... read more

Nearly three months after returning to the United States from my internship in Brussels, Belgium, after applying for nearly 85 different jobs, I have found and accepted a position in Washington D.C.! Though I had never been to D.C. before this summer, for years I have wanted nothing more than to end up in D.C. On August 3rd I will start a position as the Press Assistant for former Vice President Al Gore's non-profit The Alliance for Climate Protection and I could not be more excited. - July 23, 2009 It's now been over a year since I started writing this post that I, until now, had not been able to find the time to complete. That in and of itself is very indicative of what my life was like in D.C. From the moment I ... read more

Originally I was gonna stay with another 2p2er here, but thanks to an evil GPS which sent us in the wrong direction, I ended up missing my bus and the timing didn't work out in the end. Instead, I arrived at 5am and made my way to the hostel which was small and shabby but very cosy and friendly. There weren't any staff there so I just curled up on a couch in the common room and slept until about 10am when they arrived. T he first day I went to do the typical touristy sight seeing that is inevitably going to happen in Washington. After seeing the White House (which really isn't anything special, you can't even go very close.. The only interesting thing about it was the sniper on the roof I managed to ... read more

Today was our first day officially in Washington, DC. Our goal was to see a few museums, maybe a few monuments and try to stay cool as the temperature soared. We did pretty well on most. I don't like heat. We spent 5 minutes in the truck on our way to Greenbelt Station, our subway stop of choice for the next four days. It's truly amazing that we could be on a train heading in to DC within 15 minutes of leaving the campground. And it's only $55/night! The ride in was great, given that it's a weekend, and we hopped off at Archives/Navy Memorial. The boys think the subway is cool. After checking out a couple monuments Jeff and I had not seen before (one for a virtual cache), we headed to the International Spy ... read more