An early start for the first day of university related activities. Today's activities consisted of seeing many of Washington's monuments, which I was looking forward to, with the worst lecturer I have ever had as tour guide, which I most certainly wasn't looking forward to. Another factor that we were coming to terms with was the combination of two very important truths: First, Americans put sugar in everything, and second, sugar makes you pee. We were little worried that a day spent mostly on a bus before our bladders had adjusted to this diet could have become very messy very quickly.
The first stop on the tour was the Capitol, which involved us standing outside the security barriers in place for the presidential inauguration. As we were there for nearly twenty minutes we also checked out the nearby statues of James Garfield and Ulysses Grant.
Our lecturer/tour guide informed us that the statue atop the dome is "Lady Liberty" but Wikipedia assures me that it is the Statue of Freedom, confirming my belief that the Statue of Liberty is on Liberty Island in New York after all.
James A. Garfield Ulysses S. Grant
The bus then took us past the Washington Monument, which is still closed due to earthquake damage, and around Tidal Basin. Despite stopping to take photos at several memorials the majority of what our tour guide had to say was how disappointing it was that we'd miss the Cherry Blossom Festival and how beautiful the Cherry Blossom festival is and that the Cherry Blossom festival is a great example of integration of cultures. He did give us some information about Thomas Jefferson, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Martin Luther King Jr, but given the reactions of others on the bus I am assuming it was mostly incorrect.
The Jefferson Memorial
Apparently Jefferson single-handedly wrote the US Constitution according, once again, to our lecturer
The Roosevelt Memorial is the only presidential memorial to feature a statue of a First Lady or Presidential Pet
I found it ironic that the Martin Luther King Jr Memorial was made from white granite but I was quickly informed that the type of stone used was one of the least controversial aspects of this memorial.
By this time my camera, which had been making weird noises all morning, decided that it didn't want to change focus at all so all my pictures had to be at exactly the right distance or they were completely out of focus. I had plenty of time to try and fix this, though, as we drove to Mount Vernon.
After God knows how long of our lecturer randomly announcing a fun fact he'd obviously just remembered, and remembered incorrectly at that, we arrived at George Washington's house. Having arrived we then got to wait in the tour bus while the lecturer went and booked tickets, because prebooking is not something to worry about when organising an international trip for just over 40 people.
Eventually we gained admission and were soon sitting through a 25 minute orientation film detailing the life of George Washington that everyone agreed we could have done without. After the film we had roughly 20 minutes left before we had to be on the bus again which meant that by the time the last group had made it through the house itself we were already running late.
The house itself, no pictures were allowed inside unfortunately
As you can see my efforts to fix my camera resulted in it randomly giving a fish eye effect to almost all my photos
After our rush to get back to the bus we drove back into DC for lunch at the Union Station food court, apparently a must for our US cultural experience. We spent as long in the food court as we had at Mount Vernon which seemed excessive but I find myself unable to complain about the stop as it included my first ever taste of Ben and Jerry's.
After lunch we headed out of DC again to visit Arlington Cemetery. Yes, for those of you keeping score we traveled from Maryland to DC to Virginia to DC to Virginia. Upon arriving we once again stood around waiting, this time for the bus that would take us to JFK's grave and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
I ended up at the back of the line for the bus back to the cemetery entrance and it was already full before I was able to get on meaning I needed to walk back to the entrance. This walk turned out to be the most moving experience of the entire visit to the cemetery, not just because I got a much clearer idea of the scale of the place than I did from the bus but also because of the quiet and peacefulness of the grounds.
I feel like the contemplative experience is lost thanks to the fish eye effect
After Arlington, we headed back to DC once again. Back, in fact, to within spitting distance of the Tidal Basin and the monuments we'd seen before heading to Mount Vernon. This time it was to see the Lincoln Memorial and nearby Korean War Veterans Memorial and Vietnam Veterans Memorial.
The Korean War Veterans Memorial
Every service and support role is represented pictorially on the sandblasted wall
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial
The name of every soldier either killed or missing in action during the conflict is etched on the wall
The tribute to the women who served in Vietnam, mostly as nurses
The Lincoln Memorial
The statue's hands make the ASL signs for A and L The Gettysburg Address is reproduced in full
We also found place where Martin Luther King Jr delivered his famous I Have a Dream Speech, but unfortunately the lighting wasn't conducive to my photos of the dedication there being in focus.
Eventually we headed back to the bus and on to dinner at a 'traditional' Italian restaurant where the meal included, confusingly, a Greek salad. Soon enough, though, dinner was over and we headed back to the hotel to get some sleep before our introduction to American education tomorrow.
Culture shock for the day: Marinara pasta sauce. In America this is equivalent to a napolitana back home and includes exactly zero seafood. Weird.
Next time: More statues at the University of Maryland!
