Friday morning Nancy, a friend, came to pick me up from the house. We went together to the Nasa Goddhart center, outside Washington. We had some small troubles finding the way to there, but we managed and it was worth the journey. Anyway, it was a pleasant ride and we talked a lot. There was an exhibition hall at this Space Center, like a small museum. They had real-size models of the Apollo shuttles, and I actually sat in one them. So small!

We had lunch together in Danny's. Later that afternoon I went to the Air and Space museum, downtown Washington. It was recommended to me by many people... and they were definitely right, it was very impressive. The museum contains many real airplanes, space artifacts and missiles. The building is huge to accomodate all these.

There was a piece of the moon, that you could actually touch. Nice! I saw the plane that the Wright brothers used, and a real exemplar of one of the Apollo shutles. I liked the part about computer-based aircrafts, because there was some stuff about the history of computers as well. It was the first time I saw a real radio-tube, which was used in computers before transistors were invented.

On my first day here I saw the White House. Today it was time for the other 2 branches of government: Congress and the Supreme Court.

I went for a tour through the Capitol, the building where the Senate and House of Representatives are. It was really very nice, the guide had good stories about the history and present of the Capitol. After the tour I went to see the Chamber of the House of Representatives, which is the room where the President holds his State of the Union speech.

After wards I went to the Supreme Court. I was there yesterday afternoon as well, but the main hall (where the judges work) was closed, because there was a session. Today it was open to the public, and a lady gave a short lecture on how things work at the Supreme Court. It was very nice to be inside such an important institution.

I went to the Library of Congress Wednesday afternoon. It's a must for somebody like me, who loves books and reading.

Next to the building, which is really pretty (see the picture on the left of
the main reading hall), there is also a museum inside. They had a lot of special items on display. I particularly like the notebook of Edison, with sketches and drawings of his design for a phone.

In the evening we went to see a movie, Once Upon a Time In Mexico. It was nice, but not all the actors were very good. The music was wonderful though.

It looks like the hard drive of Guus Bosman.nl is really reaching the end of its life.

The website itself still works (obviously, otherwise you wouldn't be reading this), but I'm afraid the situation isn't very stable.

I hope the site will keep working until I'm in the Netherlands again.

I am writing this from the main World Bank building, in the center of Washington. It's really interesting to be inside here. I got a
visitor's badge, with my picture on it, that allows me to go around in the building. Before you enter there's a security check, like in most public places here.

The building is made with a lot of glass. The main hall is very light and it's huge. I saw the place where Sasha is working, on the 4th floor. She has her own office, very convenient.

Monday we had lunch together in the Bank. There are more than 120 different nationalities working here, so there's a enormous wide variety of food to choose from. I had an Etheopian meal. The chicken was very delicious, it was made with some spices I didn't know. It came with a small portion of vegetables (I thought). When I tasted it, it was some sort of sour sambal: extremely sharp and spicy. It's nice to experiment a bit...

Important visitor
Yesterday I came to pick up Sasha, and I waited in the hallway. Inside the main hall there was a reception, and outside there was a black limousine waiting. There were two black cars with mirror-windows and a few police cars around it. A few security people were waiting: some Americans, two others were speaking Russian. After a while somebody came out of the Bank, probably an ambassador or minister, surrounded by bodyguards. The cars left with the sirens on, so they didn't have to wait in traffic. Interesting.

In fact, you can see this quite often: huge colonnes of police cars, motor cycles, and a few black cars. When I was near the White House I also saw such cars, so I suppose I saw (the car of) the President or somebody quite important.

Tourist in the Bank
In the bank there is also a magazine shop, with economical and political magazines from all over the world. I'll definitely spend some time there! In fact, there is also a big section of the library with magazines.

Everybody in the building here is dressed up, it's quite official. There's an interesting mixture of suits: American, Italian, English, and there are some people from India who wear their specific dresses.

In a while I'll go up to the 12th floor, the see the view from there. This building of the World Bank is connected to that of the IMF (International Monetary Fund). Perhaps I'll try if I can get in there with my visitor's pass.

Yesterday I made a trip outside Washington. I went to Mount Vernon, which is the mountain where George Washington lived.

It's about 25 kilometers from the city; I went there by metro and then I took a local bus. It's a long trip, but I enjoyed it quite a lot. I bought a newspaper (the Washington Post of course), and read it entirely. It's really big; it's the size of Saturday newspaper in the Netherlands.

George Washington was the general of the United States during the Revolutionary War and later he became the first president. He also choose the location of the capital, which was later called after him.

Mount Vernon consists of the mansion where Washington lived, with all the estates around it. It is really well conserved. There's the mansion, side buildings, his slaves' buildings, and a huge park. I took a guided tour through his house, which was really interesting. In the hallway there was the key of the Bastille, a gift to George Washington by Marquis de Lafayette. The destroyed Bastille was the start of the French revolution.

The weather was really nice, so I sat on the veranda overlooking the Potomac river for a while. I was back in Washington around 16:30 o'clock, where I had some coffee and visited a bookstore. This place is simply a paradise when it comes to reading.

I made a long trip through old town Washington today. I started in the US National Archive, which was really interesting. I saw the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights (the real ones!). They also have online versions.

I visited the National History museum as well. That place is just enormous, and I'll definitely go back there again this week. The cool things is that all these museums are free. This makes it very easy to walk in for just a while, without the feeling that I'm wasting my money.

Yesterday we traveled a lot. Rosa, a friend, brought us to a town called Alexandria. It's an old harbor city with a rich history. Robert E. Lee, the General of the Confederates in the Civil War lived there. We had lunch in a Tavern where George Washington and John Adams used to visit. The town is carefully preserved, and many house are in the old style, really pretty. Next to his Tavern we also saw the church where Washington used to go, and the house he used to live in (before he moved to a bigger place on a hill near the city Washington).

In the afternoon we went to Baltimore; a city north of Washington. We saw the harbor there, which is a beautiful place with many bars and cafes. Regular readers will know that I love books and reading. There was a wonderful, huge bookstore there, with 5 stories of books, books and books.

Today I'll read my travel guide of Washington, and after lunch (here in the World Bank) I'll go and see some other touristic things.

Saturday we spent in the city to see some landmarks. Of course we started in the center, where we saw the White House and had coffee in Starbucks.

Later we took the metro to the Pentagon, something I really wanted to see. It's a massive building, very big. We walked around it, and saw the reconstruction from the damages of September 11th.

From there we took a long walk back to the city, over the Memorial Bridge towards the Lincoln Memorial. We had dinner in Union Station, the big train station of Washington that has recently been renovated. Saw a beautiful exposition there with pictures by a famous photographer (I've forgotten his name) of the city.

I am in Washington! It's really very nice to be here -- we had a great weekend together. I'm in the World Bank now, I'm writing this from a library.

I had a nice journey. The flight to Philadelphia took about 8 hours. It has been years since I flew so I really enjoyed it. Of course there was a movie, I saw "the Italian Job". Security was pretty tight on the airports. At Schiphol there was a interview, and everywhere there were extensive luggage checks.

In Philadelphia I took a domestic flight to Washington. I had 2 hours, so I looked around at the airport, and tried a real American hamburger. The flight to Washington was really short, it took about 40 minutes to get there. The plane flies right over the Potomac river, which makes for a great view over the city. You can immediately see the Capitol and other famous buildings. Sasha came to pick me up; it's very nice to be together. That evening we went to George Town, an older part of the city.