Observation Walk

Sometimes, I really like to go for what I call an "Observation Walk." DC is a great city, actually maybe the best city, to do this in. Basically I just walk with my iPod for as long as I can go until I get bored then try and remember some funny or interesting things I saw. Here's a list of some great things I saw today on my dusk walk all around the monuments.

-about 34 planes take off from Reagan and almost take out the Lincoln Memorial
-about 100 flags flying at half-mast in honor of the death of Sen. Robert Byrd
-at the Washington Monument, I saw the sun set over the Lincoln Memorial, reflecting pool, and WWII memorial
-from the Washington Mon, I realized you can see the Jefferson Memorial, Potomac River, Lincoln Memorial, WWII memorial, Vietnam Vets memorial, Korean War Memorial, White House, and Capitol all depending on where you stand at the monument
-a set of identical twin guys wearing yellow shirts and jeans (reminded me of Ravi)
-about 500 flags being set up for the 4th of July
-about 9340823759784 tourists
-a family of a dad and 3 little kids all dressed in their complete Sunday best entering through White House security and being allowed into the building (if only I knew who they were!)
-for some reason they had all the closest lookout points closed to the WH
-a Caterpillar construction machine in the WH lawn
-about 30 games of softball being played all over any green lawn, anywhere
-and finally, a building I have never noticed-the federation of American States building that has all the names of all the countries in the Americas on it-US, Brazil, Haiti, Cuba, Uruguay, Colombia, Mexico, Argentina, Chile, you get the picture
-this was complete with a statue of Simon Bolivar


I don't feel like a tourist anymore! StL landscape doesn't look anything like here, but I still miss it. :(



SO WHO'S COMING TO VISIT?!!!?

Little Things I Like About DC

1. The thunder sound the Metro makes when its in the tunnel about to arrive
2. All the different types of people
3. Georgetown
4. Starbucks on every corner
5. Not being able to walk anywhere without passing the White House, monuments, or government buildings
6. How low it looks like the planes are always flying really low and close (Reagan is really close, a few metro stops away)
7. The morning GW Athletes gym...I'm usually the only one there

Today I went to the Zoo, which was disappointing compared to the St Louis Zoo which is so much better. BUT. I did see a panda which was pretty cool. I also went to the Korean War Memorial and the Vietnam Vets Memorial Both are very nicely set-up, with the architecture and the way of presenting them. The Korean War Mem is really neat, its a bunch of soldier statues as though walking through a field. I'm also going to add a picture of it in the winter, it looks gorgeous.

Watching the US-Ghana game now!!

Today at work

Today at work they put me in charge of finishing a whole news story about BP and Tony Hayward to send to Caracas to be approved! YAYYYYYYY!!! Hopefully we will put it on youtube, so i can put the link up here!
I'm so excited to be able to do what I love, and work with Willy the awesome cameraman!

NYC

Right now I find myself on the Megabus from New York to Washington..thank you, Megabus for the free wifi even if it doesn't allow you to get on youtube. And darn you, Bryn, for deciding to sit in front of the 33 year old grandmother smacking her gum, screaming on her walkie-talkie cell phone, and her 3 year old grandson, chomping grapes and getting yelled at because he wouldn't tell the 33 year old grandmother he loved her the whole 5 hour long drive. Oh, and she said the f word about every other word. To her 3 year old grandson. If she yells any louder I don't know what I'll do. Shameless, in a bad way.

New York was fun. Seeing Leigh and Mom was a blast. The city is crazy busy, people running around everywhere at all times of the day. Truly tiring for someone like me who is not accustomed to big city living and who doesn't particularly enjoy big cities. However, we survived, even though my mom's feet were bothering her the entire time we walked all over. It was very exciting seeing all the things from the movies and the sights you have to see at least once in your life. I am truly grateful to my mom for bringing us and for the welcome break from work. But, it'll hopefully be many years before I make it back to NY. Once every ten-twenty years.

Anyway we hit all the touristy sites and spent a lot of money on taxis and were able to go to a Broadway show, Memphis, which was really fun and upbeat concerning racial separation and civil rights mixed in with the music industry in Memphis in the early 1960's. Leigh went to Promises, Promises the night before by herself and saw Kristen Chenowith (from Wicked and now Glee) and she got Sean Hayes (Jack from Will & Grace)'s autograph when she stood outside the stage door waiting for him.
My favorite attractions were the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) and Ellis Island. Its amazing that a nation founded on immigrants now decided they have too many. MoMA gave me some great ideas for my next wood project (another table, where am I going to put it???) OH. Any by the way, we met Al Roker and Ann Curry at the Today Show. And Valerie Bertinelli. I shook all their hands! Ann even held onto my hand for a while. I thought it was a little weird, too. But she's so sweet.


NY makes DC seem like a small town. And I still haven't decided if I like living there. It was really weird getting back on the bus by myself to go back to DC while Mom and Leigh got on a plane for St. Louis. Gosh! I miss that place.


Pics in another post. It is easier to put them up alone.



-----It's not about where you're going. What really matters is where you came from.----

This is the video we filmed while at the hearing on the Arizona law. As you can see at the end of the video, I'm famous and on South American TV! Look for me on the left in the wide shot of the audience in the blue dress at time 1:35.

Click here

click for more info on the protest:
and the hearing:
and finally, the correspondent i was working with, nitza:

Cool day at the office!

Today we had an exciting day at the office! In addition to getting my REAL ID AND REAL LANYARD with the AP symbol...

We went hurriedly at 2 to a protest that was happening within the capitol at a representatives office. People (Code Pink) were threatening to be arrested for protesting, because they felt so strongly about the government not doing anything against Gaza.

I watched Nitza the reporter (one of my supervisors) and Willy, the cameraman, get some great shots and have her do a stnad-up which is the head shot of reporter outside the place telling whats going on.

After that protest (interesting!) we went to a COngressional hearing. This one I loved. There were 5 Mexican women, including one only 11 years old, that testified against abuses by the police in Arizona following this new law. Really what they were trying to show was that Obama is going to kill he narco-traffickers and the dangerous people, but by sending more military and supporting the Arizona law, he is creating more discrimination and harsh abuses.

All of the women were victims of abuse in some form. The little girl had lost her whole family. The one suffered beatings in a deportation prison. There was a translator talking to one who didn't speak English the whole time. I wished I could have been her translator.

Here are pics of the protest. Ill see if I can find some video. And also put up a pic of my LEGIT ID card.

New Job!

I think that from here on out I will be writing many LESS blog posts. The reason, you ask? I TYPE ALL DAY. I'm on my computer the entire day from start to finish. Thank GOD I got this new MacBook even if it was expensive.
So, basically, what the interns do at TeleSUR is prepare all the stories and story ideas for the correspondents. Kind of like a backbone and all the stories and news material coming out of DC to the Latin American audience is the body. I work with 4 correspondents, Andrea, Nitza, Reed, and Kaelyn. Reed and Kaelyn are working on a story about the Honduran coup and so I have been helping them a lot with that--mostly transcribing interviews with foreign officials and also Hillary Clinton. I have also been asked to try yo get an interview with Helen Thomas, the lady just basically fired from the White House for saying the Jews should get the "hell" out of Israel and "go home". Which is pretty sassy. She's 90 anyway. So...
After that impossible task failed, I worked on some other stuff. I have an AP press pass which is pretty cool which I'll upload a photo of as soon as I get it. I would say more about my job but maybe I will this weekend after I have not typed in a couple of days. And I walked to work this morning and it was a success. I walk home every night but don't love walking in the morning (have you SEEN how bad I sweat?) but today was cool and beautiful. Plus I just buscar la sombra (ok stay in the shade). Ok well gotta go transcribe some more of an interview with former foreign minister of Honduras Patricia Rodas under president Manuel Zelaya who was ousted during the coup in 2009. It takes like 2 hours just to transcribe (type the speech) of like 5 min of video. Fabulous. And she's quite the talker. Hasta luego, and if you have questions about my job, I'm on my email ALL DAY so feel free to send me an email and I'm more likely to write back. I don't like this, feelings like a "real" person. I work in an almost windowless Associated Press office....if this is the real world, count me out!

First Exploration in DC

Yesterday I was able to go exploring all day, so I walked all over the city for about 5 hours and was able to see the Washington Monumnet, Lincoln Memorial, White House, WWII memorial, Library of Congress, National Archives, Smithsonian Museums, and the US capitol, among many other interesting things!
I am feeling much better about my living situation, and I wanted to thank everyone that's been checking in and been so supportive during the last few days! DC is great, the city is very pretty and every building looks important, because it probably is.

I went out last night to meet some of my friend Mark's (Leah's little brother) co-interns and then we took the metro to Dupont Circle which is a really cool area with great nightlife and a lot of cool restaurants and shops and we met a girl I have been emailing about DC a lot, she is a friend of a friend from Mizzou. She's lived here about 2 months. The night turned out well. It was very obvious that Dupont was the place to be on a Friday night because at 2:30 AM when we got back on the metro it was full of young people.

PIctures:

Well, let's just say my first day in DC has been an ADVENTURE. I still haven't slept since I got on the plane, about 34 hours ago. So I'm a bit tired. Turns out the place I was going to live was filled with not only hippies but a lot of CAVE CRICKETS. If you don't know what those are, consider yourself lucky. So at 4am, I booked a room for the 2 months in a dorm at GW and moved in roughly 4 hours later to find that I have 2 roommates this time, I think Courtney and Lauren. I haven't really met them yet. I don't think they were expecting me though, since all of this happened so fast. I have been exploring only to Target twice and to CVS to get my Metro pass. Turns out my internship site (which starts Monday) is only a few stops away on the blue line. I'm getting to be a pretty much expert at the Metro...yeah, right. But, it'll come. At this point I just unloaded all my stuff into the closets and the dresser and am waiting for my roommates to return from their internships so I can meet them. In the meantime, I might go for a walk/run to clear my mind and explore, always! It has gotten cloudier here so it will be cooler, but its HUMID like Missouri...imagine that. I am missing St. Louis with all my heart but I know this is a good experience and I feel much more comfortable in my new living space. Here are some pics and a pic of those nasty things called cave crickets. Hope you never have to see one.
I know, boring pics. The monuments will come later. Hopefully on my run tomorrow I can reach the Lincoln Memorial. Hope :)

Washington, DC

In two days time, I will be getting on a plane to Washington, DC, for the summer for an internship I have with TeleSUR, a South American news network whose only US affiliate office is in DC. I am SO excited for the opportunity to use my Spanish in a "real" setting and hopefully be able to use my other communications skills as well. I am living on the George Washington Campus (GWU), just 6 blocks from the White House! If all goes as planned, I will have to walk past the Obamas' house to get to work. After I arrive, I will keep you updated on all the new, and hopefully exciting adventures I encounter, people I meet (Michelle O?), and wonderful things I see!