behind enemy lines

Posted: July 8th, 2010 Filed under: Travelling, USA, washington dc | Tags: 4th of july, squirrel, travel, USA, washington dc | 1 Comment »

It’s 4th of July, Independence Day, I’m walking down towards The Pentagon while swirling a US flag in one hand, while robotically chanting “God bless America”. All to avoid being a victim of the joyous “beat a foreigner” day.

Okay, I should probably make it clear right away; behind enemy lines is a bad title. The US has treated me well so far, despite some unnecessary heat and humidity. It’s soon to be a week since I arrived, and I’m still up and going.

I arrived last Friday, and finally after dragging my way through the slow moving line in  immigration, I made it into DC. The rest of the day consisted of attending at Poets, the weekly social event at the museum. Come Saturday it was an all out pool party, with many slow moving people as a result of the night before. Despite the well organized Sunblock Patrol, I ended up in the shade; hot-hot-hot.

It deserves a mention; there are still squirrels around in DC. Many squirrels. You would’ve thought that 100+°F (37+°C) would get the best of the furry animals, but no.

I live at a friend’s apartment, who graciously offered me a room for my week here in DC. It’s just some blocks south of The Mall, and about half an hour walk to the museum. On the way you walk under some old railroad tracks, which seems to have had overhead lines some good years back. I think it deserved a picture.

Sunday, 4th of July, Independence Day. Combining watermelon, nachos and fireworks is a safe bet. We walked our way towards The Pentagon, as we made it to the Air Force Memorial. In disguise was a scared little Norwegian boy, trying to avoid being part of  the “beat the foreigner” fest.

We got ourselves prime seats for the event, overlooking The Pentagon and downtown DC.

The fireworks was, not surprisingly, overwhelming and good, with lots of over-stimulation; perfect.

As the fireworks was over, we made our way back home. The roads looked like scenes right out of an Armageddon themed movie, with people all over going in one direction and flashing blue lights everywhere. For the effect, several street lights went out as well.

Looking back was the Air Force Memorial, once again eerily alone.

It’s now two days till I fly up to Chicago. The plan was to stay there for some weeks, and then go inland in the country before I made my way back to DC for a concert in mid August. That was the plan. Since that plan was made things have changed, so now I’ll stay in Chicago for only a couple of days before I again start moving down towards DC. I’ll be staying in DC for the rest of the summer, working on an internship for the Smithsonian Institution, and now I’m hunting for an apartment in the DC area. May be games begin.

On a non-context related note, I want to add a picture of some busy ants. Because I can.

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