P.S.

If you want to hear more about my semester, you can follow Kim's blog here. I spend quite a bit of time with her and she seems more reliable with the whole blogging thing (she already did it well for a semester while in Spain).

Copy and Pasted from my friend Kim's Blog (with some changes)

Quick updates!

• We got our power back late last night! Heating is fantastic.
• We had our first class to discuss our trip to Greece, Turkey, and Cyprus today, and we are all deliriously excited. And no big deal, I officially know that I'm going to be in Istanbul for my [friend Kim's] birthday. Sounds miserable, no?
• It snowed again today. I swear, it's a winter wonderland here - way too pretty.
• I still really, really like Washington.

Thanks Kim!

There's hot water! :)

Snow Angels, Civility and No Hot Water

I am currently sitting on my bed in a sweatshirt and scarf under my comforter without heat or full electricity. We'll be getting to the 24 hour mark soon. And here I am, in the capital of the nation that "does big things". Lots of students on our program from other countries have been joking about this idea. It also kind of felt like summer camp last night. All of us 20somethings were forced from our computers and TVs for a little while and out into our hallways where there was light from the generators and we actually got to talk to people! Sadly, we all stayed up way too late hanging out hoping for a snow day and woke up groggy to find out that we indeed had classes today.

I was just informed that my electricity won't be coming back on until about midnight tomorrow night! (I keep saying there's no power but I do have one outlet in my room that works, what I'm most concerned about is the lack of heat and hot water.)

Since my last post, I've had more amazing guest speakers, including a former US ambassador to the UN and the director of Nonviolence International. The director of Nonviolence International put into words something I've been thinking about quite a bit lately; about living peacefully, and not just in the sense of being nice to people, but also being nice to the planet and making sure that all of my actions don't have a negative effect on someone or something else. Mr. Beers, the director of Nonviolence Int'l spoke about his vegetarianism, his limited use of electricity, the fact that he rides his bike all of the time(even in the snow!) and his pledge to give as much of his income to charity as he can. One of my assignments due next week is 1 page about my definition of peace and I'm pretty much going to write about this same idea.  In class we had to come up with a short definition of peace and mine was 'respect'. Respect for others as human beings no matter who they are, respect for the planet we live on, respect for everything and everyone. We also have to write about how we actually live our definitions of peace and I've decided that my goal for this semester is to live as respectfully as possible. I'll update more about this as the semester goes on.

Tonight (if I can get a warm shower soon) I'm going to a birthday party for my friend Alyxie, who I've been lucky to know for many years. I also went out to dinner with her, our friend Julie, and Alyxie's friends from Georgetown. It was nice to get to see another part of the city and meet new people but, it being the night of the State of the Union, the group of Georgetowners made me a bit homesick for San Francisco. Don't get me wrong, they were all lovely, kind, fun people, I just really miss San Francisco. I'm pretty sure everyone here is sick of hearing about how amazing San Francisco is. Thankfully, as I've mentioned earlier, there are a few other Bay Area kids here who I can commiserate with.

I'll leave you with some pictures of me out in the snow with those who were way more excited about it than me. I do admit that it is beautiful out there. Just a bit cold.

By the way, these pictures are courtesy of Lopo De Castro Neto. 

Making my first snow angel in a long time

Marshmallow pants

My friend Kim and I

So pretty

Quick Update

I know its been a while since I last updated this and I'm hoping for a snow day tomorrow so I have time to write a longer post. However, I thought it would be nice to tell you all that there is currently a power outage in my dorm and that there has been for about 3 hours(no heat!). There's tons of snow(for DC standards) and there was thunder and lightening before. We also heard something that sounded a bit like a transformer explosion. Don't worry, we still have internet for as long as our computers will last.

Hope you all are enjoying whatever weather you have (SO jealous of the gorgeous weather in SF right now!)!

Old Friends, New Friends and Genocide Museums

I'm going to start out by saying that I've attempted to write this entry about 4 times now and I keep getting distracted. I apologize if ends up being difficult to follow.

I've been in DC now for 2 full weeks and I've already gotten to spend time with 4 great ladies that I went to high school with. Unfortunately, going to school 3000 miles from home keeps me pretty far from the people that I spent so much time with for the first 18 years of my life. Thankfully though, 2 awesome ladies, Julie and Alyxie go to school in DC and 2 others, Hayley and Madeline have come to visit. Even though Hayley came by accident due to weather, its been great to see all of these wonderful people.

Not such a great picture; Madeline and I and, of course, Lincoln.

Speaking of wonderful people, the other students participating in the Washington Semester Program are all incredibly interesting and friendly. This past weekend I got to meet a lot of students from outside my particular class and get to know some from my class much better. It is definitely going to be a fun semester.

Now I realize that the title of this post might sound a bit odd, but last week we began to go on our field trips. (I feel like calling something a field trip makes it sound like elementary school but I do get to go to really awesome places all the time with my class). So last week we went to the Library of Congress which was a much more interesting and beautiful building than I was expecting it to be. Then on Friday we went to the Holocaust Memorial Museum. Now, I have been to 2 genocide museums in the past 8ish months--this this one in DC and the Tuol Sleng Museum in Cambodia. I've been talking with one of the girls in my class about how my favorite thing about museums and really old buildings is the history of them and the fact that the object I'm viewing or the place I'm standing experienced that history. I was much more emotionally moved by the Tuol Sleng Prison Museum in Cambodia as it was the actual site of Khmer Rouge violence. Conversely, the Holocaust Museum, which has every kind of media imaginable and was obviously well thought and planned out. The most affecting part of the museum tour for me was our afternoon meeting with a Holocaust survivor.

My class and Professor with Henry, a Holocaust Survivor

[between that last sentence and the next I had class]

I just had my first class of the week and it was wonderful. I love when I do things or meet people and feel an immediate and deep connection to the project or person. Today, Dr. Abdul Aziz Said, who pretty much brought Peace education to the US and is all around an amazing person, came and spoke with us. He has a really interesting way of teaching--through story telling and metaphors. I wanted to write down every single word that he said because it all resonated so strongly with me. I will share two things that he shared with us. 1) He said that the ecological function of humans is LOVE. think about it. 2) He gave us a few poems/prayers and I want to share this one with you...

Prayer of Remembrance 

Let us remember

the children, women and men everywhere

who live with injustice and disease

as their constant companions.

Let us connect with our sisters and brothers,

who spend their lives

establishing equal protection of the law,

and equal opportunity for all.

Let us celebrate all the people

who have spent their lives

helping make the world

a community of justice and peace.

Let us do what we can

that all creatures

may enjoy a fair portion

of the riches of our planet earth.

Let us honor our humanity

and ourselves.

-Abdul Aziz Said

So go and be peaceful today please! 

 

1 Week Already

It's been almost a week since I moved down to DC and so much has happened already, I felt an update was necessary.
So last Friday was spent with some orientation stuff for our internship class. Like I mentioned earlier, I am getting class credit for doing an internship and doing a bit of coursework related to it. Friday night I spent with some other girls at Starbucks sending out resumes and cover letters, what fun! On Saturday my roommate Allie and I ventured out into the freezing cold to the National Museum of Natural History which was really cool.  They had an entire coral reef display that was crocheted and called  the Hyperbolic Crochet Coral Reef. Interesting.

Coral Reef replicated in crochet

 We also saw the Hope Diamond...

 

 

 

 

Hope Diamond

On Sunday my roommates and I went to Target and Bed, Bath & Beyond to get stuff for our room. We spent a really long time and got quite a bit of stuff.

Yesterday morning everyone in the Washington Semester Program was invited to an Internship Bazaar. Almost 100 organizations, over 300 students, lots of fake smiling and fancy clothes. Then on Monday afternoon I had an interview for an internship and and this morning I started my internship there!

I am officially an intern at the International Labor Rights Forum whose offices are 2 blocks away from the White House! I'm not exactly sure about what my position and responsibilities are going to be but ILRF is an advocacy organization dedicated to achieving just and humane treatment for workers worldwide. Coincidentally, I started work today on the National Human Trafficking Awareness day. I learned about ILRF when I was involved with the Not For Sale Campaign last year in San Francisco. I'm already published on their blog talking about their Valentine's Day Chocolate Campaign. Go here to see the blog post and send the CEO of Hershey's a Valentine or host a screening of the Dark Side of Chocolate. Valentine's Day is coming up and lots and lots of chocolate will be purchased; much of that chocolate comes from farms in West Africa whose workers are often forced or trafficked child labor. I'll keep this blog updated with more of my ILRF work throughout the semester but you should also read their blog and possibly follow them on Twitter to find out more! 

This evening on my way home from my internship I got a phone call from a friend from home who was stuck at a DC airport because of the weather and after some negotiation with her airlines and figuring out the metro, she's now sitting right next to me! When I left my dorm to go meet her at the metro stop it was raining. By the time she got to the stop and we walked out, the ground was covered in snow. Snow day on my first real day of classes? I hope so. 




I hope the bad weather isn't negatively affecting you! Love to all!

Hello D.C.!

As you probably already know, I've left foggy San Francisco for our nation's Capital to participate in American University's Washington Semester Program this Spring. I moved into my dorm at AU's Tenley Campus yesterday afternoon and will be living here through early May. After a long day of orientation and initial class meetings today I'm exhausted and excited for what the semester has in store. I'll try to give a little overview of the program and what my semester is going to look like...

The Washington Semester Program has different programs of study and about 360 students this semester. I'm going to be studying Peace and Conflict Resolution with a little under 30 other visiting students. The program is about 1/3 international students and I know that we have students from Germany, Colombia, Brazil, France and Georgia(the country not the state) in the Peace and Conflict Class. There are four components to my semester. I will be getting credit for the (1)Peace and Conflict Seminar class, a (2)Research Class and an (3)Internship/Class and do (4)field research in Europe.

I will have an internship that I will work full days at on Mondays and Tuesday (much more about that later). Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays will be full of seminar meetings. Because the Washington Semester Program is an experiential learning program, none of my weeks will look the same and I will be spending very little time in actual classrooms. My professor, "Lefty", is going to give us the following week's schedule each Thursday. Next week, Wednesday will be spent with separate morning and afternoon classroom sessions broken up with a class lunch. Thursday morning will be spent at the Library of Congress where we will meet with our first guest speaker (1st of about 90!) and the afternoon will hold a meeting for the Research Class. Friday morning our class will be going on the tour of the Holocaust Museum and in the afternoon a Holocaust survivor will tell us her story. And that's just the introductory week! 

I will talk more about the Research and Internship components in later posts as I learn more about them. Now onto the best part...

From March 23 until April 12 I will be traveling to Cyprus, Greece and Turkey. As a class, we will spend 10 days in Cyprus in a couple of cities, 5 days in Athens, and 5 days in Istanbul. I am extremely excited for the trip for many reasons; I've never been to Europe before and have always dreamed of going to Greece, I spent a great deal of time last semester in a class at USF learning about the conflict in Cyprus and am excited to take some of that learning outside the classroom, my professor is of Greek and Turkish origin(among other things) and grew up in Cyprus, and we've already been promised that there will be belly dancing in Istanbul.

I'm sorry that this post was a little all over the place, but that's kind of how my brain is working right now. I am so excited for the rest of this semester and I doubt that I will be able to do all of the things I want to do (have a mentioned yet that I'm in DC?!). I'll leave you now with a picture of what my little corner of DC looks like so far...