washington post Feb 28

BREAKING NEWS:  Canadian Blocks becoming political in Washington! 

not the Blocks!

On Sunday February 17, after a wonderful morning with  the worshiping community of  Church of The Saviour, Dan and I decided to head downtown to join the tens of thousands walking around the White House in protest against global warming.  The proposed Keystone Pipeline from our Alberta tar sands was high on the agenda.  It just happened a CBS reporter put a mike in our faces and to our great surprise Erica appeared on Canadian national TV that evening!  Did you catch it??

Chinese Artist and Dissident showing at Hirshhorn Gallery

Weiwei photos of building of Olympic Stadium, 2008

Ai Weiwei, one of China's most prominent artists, had his first N.A. showing in Washington in Feb,

at the Hirshhorn Gallery of Contemporary Art. But he was unable to be there. Weiwei has spent time in detention for his provocative art and social activism, and is currently not allowed to leave China. He says: "It is essential for contemporary artists to question established assumptions and challenge beliefs."  Weiwei helped design the Olympic Stadium in Beijing, 2008.  

With us at the gallery are Susie and Dave Haldeman, friends from our Kentucky MCC days who live in upstate New York, and came to Washington to spend a couple of days with us.

Tiananmen Square

"For artists and individuals, you don't have to march on Tiananmen, but you have to be clear-minded...to find your own means of expression." Weiwei

The Blocks also view the portraits of Presidents!

The National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonian American Art Museum is another fine place to spend hours of time.  

One of the special exhibits is called "Bound for Freedom's Light: African Americans and the Civil War".  

We find this history both interesting historically and  disturbing socially. The population of DC today is 70% Black. Every day we travel as the minority on the city buses.

Many of the museums demand time to comprehend and integrate and I think we'll return to this one.  And to an amazing museum called Newseum: "the world's most interactive museum".

Dan reading today's headlines from around the country at
Newseum

Graffiti on Berlin Wall

Here we saw a section of the Berlin Wall and a

chunk of the Twin Towers.  We saw five decades of Pullitzer Prize winning photojournaling from around the world and we saw a wall of photos of journalists who had died while doing their work.  We read about the history of book-making and news reporting and saw ancient texts and the first newsbooks.  We visited the First Amendment Gallery guaranteeing the five fundamental freedoms in America.                                                                 

                                                                                          

Newspaper headlines from around the world following 9/11

Pursuit of civil war history takes the Blocks to Mt. Vernon

The historic site of Mt Vernon, 16 miles south of DC, in Virginia, is the location of George Washington's expansive plantation and mansion.  Here George and Martha lived for 40 years (1759-99), running his five farms quite progressively (over 2300 acres) with the help of over 300 slaves...until he was called to be the first president of the Union... and then again, until he died.  My first remark, when we saw the slave quarters was: "this is like Auschwitz" ...remembering the bunk beds stacked against the walls in the prison camp in Poland.  I would like to think the slaves were better treated than the prisoners in concentration camps, but the contrast between slave and free is stark nonetheless.  By the time he died, Washington had included in his will that all his slaves were to be given their freedom.

slave quarters

George and Martha Washington's burial site

Mt Vernon mansion

Washington is a city of remembering...

Smithsonian Gothic castle built in 1855 of red sandstone

DC finally had a warm, calm day and the Blocks headed to the Mall, the two and a half mile green space between Capital Hill and the Lincoln Memorial, for our day of remembering.  First stop, though, was the stately Smithsonian Castle, now the administration centre for all the Smithsonian Museums. From there we were in for a long walk.

After passing the Washington Monument we headed west toward the series of monuments that mark great presidents and commemorate past wars.  The memorials are spread out, each with their own space, but visually connected to give an awe-inspiring vision of grandeur and significance.

Tidal basin with cherry trees

Several monuments are off the greenway... and we enjoyed a  delightful walk around the Potomac River Tidal Basin to reach the Thomas Jefferson Memorial, modeled after the Pantheon in Rome. Jefferson himself was a renowned architect. The walkway is graced with hundreds of Japanese cherry trees donated generously to Washington by the Japanese government beginning in 1909. The trees are bearing buds and we are being assured that they will be blooming by mid-March!  Cherry blossom time is a favorite time to visit Washington.
                        

Thomas Jefferson Memorial 

Canada's gift to Washington!

                          

Beyond the Jefferson Memorial lies the 71/2 acre outdoor memorial to Franklin Delano Roosevelt, honoured for bringing the United States through the great depression and most of WWII.  The story of his four-term presidency is told in four galleries, with many profound quotes.  

The newest memorial (2011) stands within sight  of the FDR site and honours the first non-president, Martin Luther King.  Called "Stride Toward Freedom", the 30 foot monolith of pink granite from China represents the movement described as the Stone of Hope thrust from the Mountain of Despair.  We watched a group of black nursery school children lean against King!  

Stone of Hope

From there we returned to the Mall where four memorials are spaced around the Reflecting Pool.  

The National WWII Memorial, completed 2004, features 56 pillars representing the states and territories and 4,000 stars to represent the 400,000 Americans who died between 1941-1945.

The Korean War Veterans Memorial has 19 haunting larger- than- life images of soldiers slogging through a field. 


And the Vietnam Veterans Memorial...a moving representation that honours the 58,000 dead or disappeared and is designed to reflect, in its black granite V, the deep rift the war created among Americans. 

And finally we arrived at the Lincoln Memorial...a marble Greek "temple" with a 20 foot high Lincoln seated inside... surrounded by his immortal words, built around his conviction..."All men are created equal".

Reflecting Pool

from the Lincoln Memorial

                                                                             

Well, to round off a long day Dan and I hopped a subway train and sped under the Potomacc R. to the Arlington Cemetery. Six hundred and twelve acres of grave site with over 260,000 graves 
dating from the Civil War to the present graves of soldiers killed in Afghanistan.















Our final stop was at the Pentagon where a memorial has been created to honour the 286 Pentagon staff who died when the third aircraft crashed into the Pentagon on that fateful day, Sept 11, 2001. Each name is engraved on an individual wing-like structure with living water flowing alongside.

Needless to say, we were profoundly impacted by all we saw.


To close off this edition of washington post... let me give you a couple of very hopeful images...especially to be appreciated by our Manitoba family and friends!

CHEERS! SPRING IS ON ITS WAY!

washington post Feb.14

1441 Kennedy St.

There was little fanfare as the Block's drove into Washington on January 28 
The guest house, however, received them happily to join the team of volunteers! 
The Mennonite International Guest House serves a diverse population: political, student researchers,visitors to the Capital etc.  Our first week we hosted the body guard for the President of Liberia and a young woman from Albania, having lived in New York, and doing an internship with Interpol. 

                   
                                                                     

Rene (host), Marlene DeFehr (&Bill, Toronto), Patricia, Erica
& Dan, Janae (volunteer from Boston)

                                                                          
The Blocks have capably adapted to a lifestyle of hosting, cleaning, cooking...and touring         


We have also adapted admirably to busing, metro and much walking. Washington is a beautiful city of historic buildings, museums and monuments.  

Our first stop...the White House, of course, where we found workers still taking down the scaffolding from the Inauguration.  Our cohorts, Bill and Marlene DeFehr, told us gleefully how they had wangled their way into the Canadian Embassy to view the inauguration from the height of the outdoor patio, along with 200 other esteemed guests.

                                                                                                    
Blocks visit the Canadian Embassy...

new Canadian embassy on Pennsylvania Ave.

Dan also has his wiles...and of course we were neighbours of Gary Doer on Glenwood Cres before he became Premier of Manitoba! Well, we received a tour of the new embassy (built about 7 years ago with land donated by the US govt), which is much appreciated by staff.  Note Dan's inaugural speech in the auditorium!                                                   

Washington Monument and Capital Hill in the distance

There are two miles of grass that stretch between Capital Hill and the Lincoln Memorial, called The Mall. The Washington Monument sits on this mall and is still under repair since the earthquake of 2011.  Along both sides of the mall are most of the Smithsonian Museums.   

American flags wave around the monument

Blocks visit Smithsonian Museums

                                                                

American Indian Museum with Capital Building in the distance

Dan and I have visited four of the museums to date, choosing to begin with the National Museum of the American Indian.  This museum was built specifically for this purpose and was curated entirely by American Indians. The building is unique and the exhibits portraying a difficult history are very well done. "Survivance" is the theme and speaks to the ways the Aboriginal peoples have survived and are learning to thrive.  

The Air and Space Museum was both amazing and sobering....the exhibits of space technology alongside exhibits and history of war technology.  When you see missiles capable of holding three atomic bombs you can't help but shudder and pray.

space capsule

                                 

Leonardo da Vinci's Ginerva de Benc

Michelangelo's David visiting Washington 
Our next free museum was the National Gallery of Art, where we viewed David, an unfinished sculpture on loan from Florence. We learned that Michelangelo had a habit of leaving his sculptures incomplete, which may have been his was of saying "a finished work could never live up to his idea".

 The National Gallery of Art was created in 1937 by  a wealthy financier and art collector,  Andrew Mellon, and gifted to Congress.  It is purported to be one of the finest repositories of painting, sculpture and graphic art in the world. 

Blocks walk the halls of Congress

A group tour took us through the halls...the Rotunda with its beautiful cast iron dome

and crypt beneath it and the Statuary Hall. We're pleased to have been "invited" to sit in on debates in both the Senate and the House of Representatives...free tickets, again!

"In God We Trust"

dome of rotunda

Statuary Hall

Blocks love the free concerts at The Kennedy Centre of The Arts
The favorite concert so far, of four, was hearing Afghanistan's only school of  music from Kabul join with the Maryland Youth Orchestra for a wonderful evening of Afghani folk music and a very unusual rendition of Vivaldi's Four Seasons that incorporated 9 traditional Afghani instruments. It was a full house, with many Afghanis present.  The Minister of Education from Afghanistan introduced the evening and announced the positive changes and growth that have happened in Afghanistan in the last years.  The audience was wildly enthusiastic throughout, with much clapping and waving.  We saw that CBC had picked up this concert.

And on Sunday the Blocks can be seen at the Washington National Cathedral

The sixth largest cathedral in the world, Washington National Cathedral is adorned by 200 stained glass windows. This Gothic-style cathedral was planned for 200 years and finally completed in 1990. Episcopalian, the church sees its mission as embodying God's love and welcoming all faiths and perspectives. And as catalyst for reconciliation and interfaith dialogue.  We are impressed with its wide ranging programs and outreach and its wonderful worship

Space Window with a piece of space rock set in centre of the dark red circle

So in that glow, let me say that further editions of Washington Post will depend on whether the editor can become more efficient!  Needless to say, we are having a great time!