[censored] and I had another great day in Washington, D.C., thanks for asking! We got up in time to have breakfast, and then we took a lyft to the WWII memorial with the plan of getting there before the heat was too murderous to survive. I wouldn't say we were entirely successful since it was already hot as balls at ten a.m., but it's easier to put the mild discomfort into context when you're looking at a memorial to 400000+ people who died. Both our grandfathers fought in the Pacific in WWII, so this is always a moving thing...and yet that war is also slipping nearly completely from memory, which is its own bittersweet monument.
So, we spent a bit of time there, and then we walked to the National Museum of African American History, which opened nearby a couple of years ago. It's been so popular this whole time that you had to get tickets in advance even though the tickets were free, but this month they're testing walk-up ticketing. So, we walked up and were inside within ten minutes. Of course, it was still crowded inside - especially downstairs where the museum technically starts - so we went up to the top floor instead. It was full of the achievements of African Americans in the arts - music, dance, acting, etc., so that was fun. We also swung through the floor below that, with an emphasis on military service, community activism, education, and sports (so I had to see a bit about the Olympics, including a statue of the Olympians in '68 who threw a Black Panther sign in protest during their medal ceremony - Kaepernick is not the first and won't be the last as long as inequality is so rampant).
Then we went to the basement, where we discovered some of the earlier crowds had died down. The museum actually starts even deeper than that - you take an elevator with twenty or thirty other people into a subterranean space, where the experience of the Middle Passage and the slave trade is documented. It's all horrifying - child-sized manacles, stats about the life expectancy of enslaved people on sugar plantations being seven years - presented in a dark, claustophobia-inducing maze.
But the museum slowly meanders up a couple of levels, opening up and unveiling new pieces along the way. A lot of it is still grim - the part that [censored] and I both thought was among the most moving/troubling was the endless list of descriptions of enslaved men, women, children, and babies for sale on auction blocks across the US. And it's even more grim because that history continues today - it's not a surprise that the thread of racism and violence that could cause slavery, and lynchings, and stripping people of basic rights even after slavery was abolished, is still a thread that is woven into the fabric of our society today. It's no mistake, for example, that as soon as the federal government finally ended many of the oversights/protections of the Voting Rights Act, we're seeing attempts to disenfranchise blacks across the South by closing polling places, making it harder to get ID, etc. Until we truly address the horrors of the past, we're doomed to repeat it.
So - yeah, the museum was great. After we left, we had lunch at a food truck nearby, and almost melted in the heat. Then we came back to the hotel and I took a v. restorative shower and a v. v. restorative nap. I did a bit of emailing, then had a drink with [censored] and [censored]'s coworkers. We didn't linger long, though - [censored] and Kimberly (a coworker) and I had an early dinner nearby (City Tap House - tasty!) before going to a Moonlight and Monuments tour.
I didn't see much moonlight, but I saw a lot of monuments - but I can't tell you about them now because I'm falling asleep typing this, no doubt due to the extra drink and snack we had when we got back to the hotel. So now it's time for sleep - goodnight!
So, we spent a bit of time there, and then we walked to the National Museum of African American History, which opened nearby a couple of years ago. It's been so popular this whole time that you had to get tickets in advance even though the tickets were free, but this month they're testing walk-up ticketing. So, we walked up and were inside within ten minutes. Of course, it was still crowded inside - especially downstairs where the museum technically starts - so we went up to the top floor instead. It was full of the achievements of African Americans in the arts - music, dance, acting, etc., so that was fun. We also swung through the floor below that, with an emphasis on military service, community activism, education, and sports (so I had to see a bit about the Olympics, including a statue of the Olympians in '68 who threw a Black Panther sign in protest during their medal ceremony - Kaepernick is not the first and won't be the last as long as inequality is so rampant).
Then we went to the basement, where we discovered some of the earlier crowds had died down. The museum actually starts even deeper than that - you take an elevator with twenty or thirty other people into a subterranean space, where the experience of the Middle Passage and the slave trade is documented. It's all horrifying - child-sized manacles, stats about the life expectancy of enslaved people on sugar plantations being seven years - presented in a dark, claustophobia-inducing maze.
But the museum slowly meanders up a couple of levels, opening up and unveiling new pieces along the way. A lot of it is still grim - the part that [censored] and I both thought was among the most moving/troubling was the endless list of descriptions of enslaved men, women, children, and babies for sale on auction blocks across the US. And it's even more grim because that history continues today - it's not a surprise that the thread of racism and violence that could cause slavery, and lynchings, and stripping people of basic rights even after slavery was abolished, is still a thread that is woven into the fabric of our society today. It's no mistake, for example, that as soon as the federal government finally ended many of the oversights/protections of the Voting Rights Act, we're seeing attempts to disenfranchise blacks across the South by closing polling places, making it harder to get ID, etc. Until we truly address the horrors of the past, we're doomed to repeat it.
So - yeah, the museum was great. After we left, we had lunch at a food truck nearby, and almost melted in the heat. Then we came back to the hotel and I took a v. restorative shower and a v. v. restorative nap. I did a bit of emailing, then had a drink with [censored] and [censored]'s coworkers. We didn't linger long, though - [censored] and Kimberly (a coworker) and I had an early dinner nearby (City Tap House - tasty!) before going to a Moonlight and Monuments tour.
I didn't see much moonlight, but I saw a lot of monuments - but I can't tell you about them now because I'm falling asleep typing this, no doubt due to the extra drink and snack we had when we got back to the hotel. So now it's time for sleep - goodnight!
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