The Tarwathie Guide to DC

Engineers suffer from compulsion to assign numbers to everything, and then sort. I confess. I wrote a list of all the things that we saw and did in the past month, ranked them, asked Libby to rank them, then averaged the two.

Here is our ranking system 1 to 5 stars.

***** Must See
**** Very Good
*** Good
** So so
* Waste of time
(zero stars) no opinion, didn't do that

Here are our rankings.

Rank	Stars	Description
1	5	Holocaust Museum
2	5	Smithsonian Museum of American Art
3	5	Smithsonian Museum of The American Indian
4	4	Wolf Trap
5	4	Smithsonian Folklore Festival
6	4	National Building Museum
7	4	Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
8	4	Capitol
9	4	Kennedy Performing Arts Center
10	4	DC fish wharf market
11	4	National Art Gallery
12	4	Arlington National Cemetery
13	4	Union Station
14	4	Supreme Court
15	4	Old Post Office
16	4	Smithsonian Air and Space Museum – downtown
17	4	National Archive
18	4	Iwo Jima Memorial
19	3	Bureau of Engraving and Printing
20	4	Jefferson, FDR, Lincoln, Korea, Vietnam, WWII Memorials
21	4	Chinatown
22	3	Smithsonian Natural History Museum
23	3	National Arboretum
24	3	Hirshorn Museum
25	2	Smithsonian Air and Space Museum Udvar-Hazy
26	3	Smithsonian National Postal Museum
27	3	Voice of America
28	4	House or Senate Cafeteria
29	3	NPR National Public Radio
30	3	National Sculpture Garden
31	3	USDA Cafeteria
32	2	Smithsonian National Zoological Park
33	3	Library of Congress
34	2	Smithsonian Natural History Museum – Butterfly Exhibit
35	2	Eastern Market
36	2	Smithsonian Castle
37	2	Georgetown Embassy Row
38	2	Schooner: Spirit of South Carolina
39	2	National Aquarium
40	2	DC Public Library
41	0	FBI building
42	1	National Farmers Market at USDA
43	0	White House Visitors Center
44	0	Washington Memorial
45	0	White House Tour
45	0	Newseum

Anomalies:

• The American Art Museum, American Indian Museum, and Union Station are either new or newly renovated, thus substantially raising their rank as compared to years past. Consider them.
  
  
• 30 years ago, we thought that the zoo was the top attraction in DC. This time, there were big renovations in progress and we visited late in the afternoon, and we were very disappointed. If you visit in the morning, a few years from now, it will probably be better.
  
  
• The Smithsonian museums of American History and Industry were closed for renovation this month.
  
  
• We thought that journalists are too self absorbed to pay them $20/head to visit the new Newseum. Others who went there said it was good.

The "Circulator" busses are very convenient and much cheaper than Washington METRO fares. You ride for $1 ($0.50 over 65). Transfers give you free rides on other Circulators. Most days, a transfer was accepted for the whole day. The circulators are an outstanding bargain. The METRO subway is very fast, but very expensive if you use it a lot.

Sea Otter II's guide to DC was very useful.

Embasy Row

Hogate
N 38 52.736 W 077 01.507

Today was our final day as tourists in D.C. We had an ambitious schedule. We were to walk Embassy Row, see Georgetown, go to the White House Visitor Center, and finally to a show at The Kennedy Center for Performing Arts. Well, we started out with the Embassy Row walk. We had lots of fun and took a zillion pictures. However, by the time we got back to the bus, we had been walking for four hours straight in the heat. We were beat and our feet hurt. We canceled the rest of today's itinerary.

We have pictures of hundreds of embassies, but here's a few of the best. Above left-to-right, top-to-bottom

• Unknown
• Embassy of Estonia
• Unknown trio
• Kenyan coat of arms
• Embassy of Belize plaque
• Residence of the Embassy of Great Brittan
• Entrance to the New Zealand Embassy
• Libby at Churchill's foot
• Buffaloes on the left. Buffaloes on the right. Damn the buffaloes, full speed ahead.

Most of the embassies were very beautiful. The USA is (for the time being) the richest, most powerful nation on Earth, so this is where countries would spend the most to make an impressive embassy.

We saw more black Hondas with DPL license plates than any other brand of automobile. That's surprising, and a positive plug for Hondas; they ought to make an ad.

Some embassies were embarrassing. Haiti appears to have spent more on their embassy than they ever spent on their populace. A beautiful Islamic embassy sits across the street from GB. It is abandoned, rusting, and the ceramic tiles are falling off. We guess that it must have been the embassy of Iran. Unbelievably, the Embassy of United Arab Emirates was padlocked and had peeling paint. I presume that they must have moved to more grand and richer quarters, but they ought to remove their name from the old place. The Embassy of South Korea had a huge pile of old newspapers piled in front of their front door. It looked like 3 months worth of papers. They should ask their neighbors to take in the newspapers when they're out of town.

On the modest side, a simple plaque on a door under a staircase leads to the basement office of the Consulate of Madagascar. That was charming.

The Islamic Center is very beautiful. We're not sure if it is an embassy or what.

The biggest, grandest and most beautiful of all Embassies, is that of Great Brittan. (What else would you expect?) The GB embassy compound seems to occupy two city blocks right next to the Vice President's Residence. No doubt, they bought the land in 1780 or so when land was cheap to buy.

The second most beautiful, and by far the most stylish is Sweden House.

The second grandest embassy we saw was that of New Zealand. The NZ compound was also huge. It appears that it may have been carved out of the GB embassy property. We didn't see the Canadian Embassy, but we did see an arrow pointing down an alley to it. Sounds like a juicy bit of diplomatic scandal there -- perhaps 200 years old. Why did NZ get such grand treatment from GB but not Canada?

We saw mansions for the Daughters of the American Revolution, The Daughters of American Colonists, and The National Society of Colonial Dames of America. Jeez, what a bunch of snooty matrons.

Coincidentally, I saw a sign today at the night club right in front of this marina. The night club is called H2O at Hogate. Hogate? I thought that referred to the Don Imus scandal. It reminds me though. In modern DC, they ought to have a mansion for the American Ho Society.

There are a few private homes sprinkled among the embassies. Assuming that they don't belong to ambassadors, one wonders who would pay out so many millions for such an address? Extreme diplomat wannabes maybe.

Burnout

Washington DC (see the picture)
N 38 52.736 W 077 01.507

I think we're all worn out being tourists. Exhaustion has been compounded by the oppressive heat and humidity for the past few days. Poor Libby has been especially hard hit. She was tired out to begin with from last weekend's long jaunt through the Arboretum with Jenny.

I thought about leaving DC early. However, there's no wind either, and motoring down the Potomac in this weather would be equally uncomfortable. We need to get to a place where we can jump overboard and swim to cool ourselves off.

Yesterday, I could see that Libby was in a downward spiral. She was just laying flat on the bunk in the boat, too hot to move, and too tired to sleep. The heat kept her up the night before, so she was sleep deprived. She didn't want to eat or drink. As we headed toward afternoon when the heat inside the boat would really get bad, I could see that I had to step in and save her from herself.

I forced Libby to get up and go out, despite our protests. I took her uptown to a movie. That did the trick. Sitting in the deliciously cool movie theater and watching Wall-E put a smile on her face. After the movie we went to the nearby library, and from there to a museum. Finally, not wanting to return to the boat before the cool of evening, I took her to a formal lecture.

It turns out that going to lecture was an excellent choice. The title of the lecture was "Herblock: Drawn From Memory." It was about the famous Washington Post cartoonist Herb Block. The panel was very distinguished. Roger Wilkins, Hanyes Johnson, and Tony Auth were the panelists, Pulitzer Prize winners all. These men are very intelligent and very articulate. They gave us 90 minutes of very stimulating talk. We were very glad that we went.

By the way, it is evident that DC is a very culturally rich city. One can hardly avoid it. It was also evident from the panel and from the audience questions that Libby and I are in the heartland for political liberals. If there are any conservatives in town (other than at Fox News) they are hardly evident.

A Trip to Bhutan

Washington DC, Public Library
No LL

We didn't really take a trip to Bhutan, but it feels like we did. The Smithsonian is holding a folk festival in the National Mall this week, so Libby and I went to see. They have three themes. The first two, Texas and NASA were kind of boring. The third, the country of Bhutan, was thrilling.

Neither Libby nor I knew anything about Bhutan before going. Well we learned a lot in a short time. Bhutan is a Himalayan country, not part of Tibet, bordered by India and China. It is also the place whose King declared that his goal is to maximize Gross National Happiness.

We learned that the men of Bhutan are strikingly handsome, and the women are exquisitely beautiful. Still better, they all speak excellent English (not the Queen's English but real English). Bhutan schools are all taught in English plus their native language.

Their art is beautiful. Their dances are beautiful. We listened to a lecture by their major domestic film producer. That man was so eloquent and erudite that he would be at home holding debates in Cambridge Mass. What an impressive people.

They practice Buddhism in Bhutan. They teach wisdom and method, and harmony. They embrace the five Zorig commitments ( quality, continuous learning, enterprise, dignity of labor, and resistance to corruption). With those basic values and with an intelligent and well educated people, I would say that the future is bright indeed for Bhutan.

This is the first time that they have ever presented Bhutan culture and art outside of their own borders. How fortunate for us that they decided to do that here.

I bumped in to a Bhutan man and I remember how handsome he looked. A few minutes later I saw a picture of this man (the man kneeling with a child in the collage below.) He is the King of Bhutan. Wow, never bumped in to a king before.

Libby and I were very impressed. We admire Bhutan and its people. We understand why it is called The Last Shangri-La. Too bad that it is a landlocked country and we can't sail Tarwathie there. (Alas, Bhutan is not perfect. They have troubles too. See the Wikipedia article. )

Oh yes, this morning we also took the studio tour of Voice of America. That was very interesting. I assume that you all know what VOA is.

I had always thought of it as an instrument of the Cold War, and an anachronism. But our tour guide today said that 150 million people worldwide still listen to VOA. Wow, if that number is to be believed (I'm suspicious but I have no basis to disbelieve it), it is a very significant audience. Still, we are told that the USA is losing the propaganda war, the struggle for hearts and minds, all over the world. Millions of people, supposedly the majority of Muslims, believe that 911 was a Bush plot. They believe that the USA did not set foot on the moon and that the holocaust didn't happen. If VOA does as it says -- tell the absolute truth, and tell it effectively, and to disseminate it all over the world, then how come the lies are winning?

Amazingly, VOA broadcasts in 46 languages but none of them are Arabic. Go figure.

There's another fundamental problem with VOA. It must cost a fortune to produce, perhaps as much as the collective news budgets of all private radio and TV networks in America. Yet VOA is forbidden to compete with private industry so we can't hear what it broadcasts. If one could tune to VOA every night and compare it with what is said on NPR, then we could judge for ourselves how good a job they do. If they did that, they would be in competition with NPR, and a libertarian like myself would never allow that. What a dilemma!

I left the VOA tour very disturbed. Every fact I learned about it caused 10 unanswered questions to pop in my head.

DC Pics

DC Public Library
No LL

I spent the whole day trying to put some order in to the 1,500 odd pictures we have so far from our month in D.C. It's a major job, probably more than I have the energy for.

Here's a small sample in this collage. Click on it to enlarge.

left-to-right, top-to-bottom

• Libby at Arboretum
• Lonely columns at Arboretum
• A bonsi tree
• A fossil critter from some museum
• Row 2: Attempts at photo trickery
• Arlington National Cemetary
• The Korean War Memorial
• The Vietnam War Memorial
• Libby confronts her ancestor; John Brown
• Friendly guys meeting outside the Hirshorn
• H.M.S. Pinafore at Wolf Trap
• Tomb of the Unknown Soldier
  
• Libby at Arboretum again