1st Day of Sightseeing

As is inevitable whenever I go anywhere, I spent the first day here sick. My theory is that everything's different -- the climate, the water, the food -- so the body has to adjust to the new zurroundings. I'm sure it had nothing to do with last night's dinner of potato chips and Dr. Pepper. But, I toughed it out, and rode the hotel shuttle in to Union Station to see the sights.

D.C. has to be seen to be believed. What they show on t.v. and pictures in books don't come close to conveying the sheer scope and size of the buildings. They are truly immense. Union Station is huge. It has something like 75 stores and restaurants, but they could fit a few hundred if they wanted to use all the space. Then you go outside and walk down the street to the Capitol building, and again, absoloutely huge.

Then you get to the National Mall, and it's a long series of large, immaculate buildings, mostly government in one form or another (Library of Congress, Supreme Court, Office building for the Senate, etc.) It was really quite overpowering. I kept thinking back to my six months of being sort of an American, and actually seeing these incredible buildings that I learned about all those years ago, and what they represented, it had me choking up a little bit.

The first part of the Smithsonian Institute I saw was the Museum of the American Indian. Very disappointing. It's a pretty building, shaped like a gigantic adobe hut, but the exhibits are all pretty superficial. I guess that's to be expected -- there are so many different tribes, and they all want to be represented. But not much in the way of history or the personalities, and virtually nothing on what I wanted to see -- the BLOODSHED!!!! Oh well, I guess they wanted to avoid the stereotypes.... But there was very little of anything that was of any importance to American history -- nothing on the first contact with the pilgrims, nothing about Tecumseh... just lots of clay pots and pictures of current tribal leaders.

The Air and Space Museum was another thing altogether. I'm hoping I'll be able to post some pictures, 'cuz I took a whole lot. It has to be one of the coolest places in the world, for a guy anyway. Chuck Yeager's X1 is hanging up by the entrance, right near Lindbergh's Spirit of St. Louis. The Wright Brothers' plane from Kitty Hawk is there, as well a few of their bicycles, and the wind tunnel they used to test the models they built when designing their first plane. They have the lunar module from Apollo 11, the capsule thingy that they all crashed down in, they got fighter planes from both world wars, jet fighters from the Korean War.... I'm not sure how many pictures I got, but it was a lot. I actually ran the battery out in my camera, but then I got to the exhibit that had a British Spitfire and a Japanese Mitsubishi Zero. So I found an electrical outlet, plugged in the charger, and then just stood around hoping nobody from security would see me. (Side note: we actually charged a guy in Vancouver with "theft of electricity" for doing something like this... an outlet on the outside of a building, and the accused, a homeless guy, had plugged in a radio or something like that.) After a few minutes, I had enough of a charge to take another three pics.

One mildly amusing thing. I needed a hat and a watch. The hat was easy (go Patriots!) but I didn't want to spend alot on a watch. There was a Swatch store in Union Station, but I wanted something cheaper than them. I looked everywhere. Nothing. I couldn't believe it -- I figured for sure the cheap tacky tourist kiosks would have something, a watch with a picture of the White House or Obama, or something. But no. Then I check out the gift stores at the two Smithsonian Museums (and there were five gift shops total in the two buildings). Again, nothing. I was shocked -- shocked I say! I mean hell, a picture of Sitting Bull as the watch face, with hands designed like arrows? Those suckers would FLY off the shelves. Or an airplane, with hands shaped like anti-aircraft missiles? NOTHING!

So I break down and buy a Swatch. $50. Then I'm downstairs at Union Station and come across a store I obviously missed: "Buy Obama '08". Wonderfully tacky Obama watches, six different styles, $14.95 each. Fug.