American History and Embassies

On Sunday, April 24th, I met up with my cousin and we drove over to Anacostia to visit Frederick Douglass' home, Ceder Hill. The magnificent house has been preserved in great condition and contains about 80% original items. The house also has a gorgeous view of Washington below, and from the front porch, one can see the Washinton Monument and all of Capitol Hill. After Douglass' death, his second wife and his children fought over the house, due to a lack of witnesses to his will. The house ended up in a public auction, where the wife borrowed enough money from friends in order to buy the house back. She donated it later to the National Parks Service in order to keep Douglass' memory alive.  Frederick Douglass was a boss though - he...

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Posted in: Anacostia,Arlington Cemetery,Ben's Chili Bowl,Civil War,English,Frederick Douglass,J-Mad,Memorials,U Street,Washington DC

April Adventures

Since the last post, April took off with a flying start and was a very busy, final month in DC. One of my friends from New York City came down to DC for the Cherry Blossom Festival. Luckily, there were still enough blossoms outside. We spent the weekend seeing all the different memorials and went to Tidal Basin area twice to see the blossoms. There was also a kite festival taking place on the National Mall by the Washington Monument. On the final day that we went to Tidal Basin, we stopped by the Jefferson memorial. We happened to be there at the right time on the one not-rainy day that weekend, and there was a group setting up for a wedding. There were two guys with guitars under trees outside waiting for it to start. Because the...

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Posted in: Annapolis,Botanical Gardens,Capitol Hill,Cherry Blossoms,English,J-Mad,Library of Congress,National Arboretum,Navy,Washington DC

Last Spring Days in the District

interior of the Old Post Office With my internship coming to an end, I spent the last few weeks catching up on things I wanted to see and taking family to some sites. When some relatives came to visit in the last week of April, our first stop was the Old Post Office on Pennsylvania Avenue. We went up the bell tower and saw the bells (made to be in tune to the bells at Westminster Abby) and went to the top for a 360 degree view of the city. After the Post Office, we walked over to Archives to look at the Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights. From here, we went to Good Stuff Eatery over in Eastern Market by the Hill for lunch. Our next stop was a tour through a congressional office of Capitol Hill. The...

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Posted in: Adams Morgan,Capitol Hill,Eastern Market,English,Ford's Theatre,J-Mad,Memorials,Washington DC

Kicking Off April

To kick off April, I met up with some friends and we took a mini-roadtrip out to Reston, VA, to visit Jackson's Restaurant, while another friend was working. The restaurant's food and drinks were amazing. After spending a while in Jackson's eating and waiting for our friend to finish his shift, we walked around Reston until we arrived at another local restaurant - Clyde's. On Saturday, I took a trip to the Library of Congress to get my library card. Library cards are required in order to access different reading rooms in the Library of Congress' various buildings, including the main reading room in the Thomas Jefferson building. Since it was raining pretty heavily, I got some research done on ancient computers in the law reading room...

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Posted in: Capitol Hill,English,J-Mad,Library of Congress,National Aquarium,Washington DC