D. C.

A long weekend close to Thanksgiving celebrations meant I could fly out of Madison to Washington D C to meet my sister Vedha, Arun and little Rishi (my nephew). Stopping over at Ashish's place for a night was also good fun - catching up about school days and how he used to spread all kinds of rumours about me, speaking to school friends and eating awesome food.

The sub urban city of Leesburg, where Vedha stays, is just off D. C., inside the state of Virginia. It gives a small town feeling, with large open spaces, sloping roads and beautiful houses, like her's. After a sumptuous Thanksgiving lunch, I had a short nap, only to wake up to Rishi's puzzled looks about why I was the only guest refusing to leave his home. It took some convincing for him to accept me and my presence over the next three days :)

The Air and Space Museum, a part of the Smithsonians, which we visited the next day, was huge and really well managed. I particularly liked the section on the Japanese and German bombers. The facilities of guided tours, and random oral demonstrations, gave meaning to our time there. Otherwise, a visit to a museum gets reduced to a mere walk in the park.

The next morning, a short ride on the Metro took me to the heart of D C. Bright, sunny and really windy, it was a perfect day for walking around the place. Add to that my friends Pallavi, Abhilash, Abir and Rachna, who came over from their universities for that day, it sure was gonna be fun. Our first stop was the Holocaust museum. Three expansive floors dissected every detail of events like Hitler's rise to power, the Nazi atrocities, and the victory of the Allied powers. As is customary, every visitor is given an identity card that tells the real story of a person who lived during the Holocaust . I was Herman Klein, a Jew from Czechoslovakia who was deported to Auschwitz at the age of 16 but escaped certain death when American troops liberated a concentration camp in Dachau, Germany.

Walking through wagons used by the Nazis to hound off Jews to concentration camps, listening to audio recordings and watching videos of Jews being persecuted... all this was spine chilling. We came out of the Museum after a good three hours - some shaken, some depressed... everyone quiet. It was a gripping experience, just like I had imagined.

Our next stop was the scene of the gatecrashed dinner (so much so about security, does such a thing even exist today?)- the White House. The house was being prepared for World AIDS day, while the area right in front of the House was buzzing with anti-war, anti-racism demonstrations, tourists, cameras and the press. To get a decent look into the monuments around DC, you better put on your walking shoes. Parking is expensive and hard to find, and the monuments seem close but are actually quite a walk away from each other.

The Washington Monument, built in memory of the country's first President, George Washington, towers over every other structure in the vicinity. It also gives a scenic view of the Lincoln Memorial, the Capitol Building and the White House. Our final stop was the Museum of American History, where we managed to hover over the 'Science in America' section in an hour. Walking through the beginning of chemistry research in the United States of America (at Johns Hopkins) all the way through the Manhattan Project up to the current thrust on DNA sequencing, this section did a neat job of presenting science to the layman. I also came across a few witty quotes (see attached images). Each Museum is a world in its own and one can spend a whole month by just visiting the Smithsonians.

A nice dinner at American Flatbread, with pizzas baked in a brick-oven, and using organic ingredients, wrapped the DC visit. I flew back to Chicago next morning and got back to a cold, rainy Madison by evening.

The past week, like most other weeks, has zipped past. I am already staring at a couple of exams and the end of this first semester in graduate school. Phew.... time does fly!