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‹ Previous (23/10/2010) MONTH Next (2010-12-22)› ‹ Previous (2010-10-08 - Canada) COUNTRY Next (2011-01-23 - Mexico)› US Washington DC, DC (see on map) 22/11/2010:
Washington is a paradise for tourists and also for travellers, and personally I would have been here many more days but we did not want to abuse the hospitality of Mack, Masha and Giana. The three treated us very well, but we just did not connect very well, perhaps because they were too young or because they relied on too much fun, party and the alcohol. However, Macks crazy mentality allowed us to enjoy a unique experience, I would say very American. As soon as we arrived in Washington, Mack told us to go with him and Gianna to see ´The Room´ the worst movie ever filmed and projected in a cinema. I wondered what was the point of going to see a bad movie but then he told us that the film was so grotesque that it was precisely the grace, and that´s why viewers are cut short. I thought the director (and actor) Tommy Wiseau have expressly made a bad movie, but no, the film tried to be a good movie, but it was blurred in many instances, the sets were horrible, the dialogue and the reactions of the characters were whimsical, the engagement of all actors was painful ... However, the public and even we had a great time, thanks to alcohol, but also by the environment. Many spectators had come filled with plastic spoons and every time a scene was showing a picture of a spoon (the decor) the public threw spoons against the screen. At the same time, the audience kept shouting ´it´s out of focus!´ or repeating the absurd dialogues of the actors, while some others were playing throwing the football ball, and a few others were poured into the soil beneath the screen to pick up some plastic spoons. It was a surreal spectacle that many of them repeated every month, coming to worship a director that did not deserve anything and that had become famous for a bunch of drunks. As I said, me and Alexandra also we had a very good time, but honestly, before repeating it, I prefer to see a Marx Brothers movie, where surrealism is a little studied and worked. The movie ´The Room´ was an exception to Washigton, a city where the harmony and order could be one of its main features. Washington is the capital of the United States, where the White House, the residence of the President, the Capitol building, where the Senate (two senators per state) and the chamber of congress (with a number of delegates proportional to state population), which together with the president decide the future of the country. We visited the White House and the Capitol on the outside, but also visited a couple of the many monuments dedicated to different U.S. presidents, such as 169 meters obelisk dedicated to the country´s first president, the general who had fought in Washington against the English, and the monument to President Lincoln, who had united the country after a bloody civil war. I also visited the memorial to American soldiers killed in the Vietnam War, leaving aside the visit of the memorials to the Holocaust or American soldiers who died during World War I, World War II or the Korean War. Added to all these memorials and monuments around the park called the National Mall one can also visit many museums, all free of charge. I visited the air space and the museum of natural history, all with much interesting information that I practically oversaturated myself with knowledge and decided not to visit any other, partly because of lack of time. To be more slowly absorbed so much knowledge, would have been better than other cities in the United States had received some of these 19 free Smithsonian museums, which would add a zoo and botanical gardens. Although the current distribution allowed the observation of the overall legacy of the British scientist James Smithson (1765-1829), who in his will left 104,960 gold coins (equivalent to $ 10,100,997 in 2008) to the United States government to create an institution dedicated to the development and diffusion of knowledge among people. Surely today should be more people like this man James Smithson.
With an eye on the state of Florida, we began descending from Washington towards the south, stopping on the second day in Jamestown and Yorktown, two historically important sites, although not as visually appealing. Jamestown only has some ruins of an ancient town and an interesting museum illustrating how, after 18 failed attempts to settle in other parts of the coast of North America, English colonists finally managed to create the first permanent settlement in 1607. However, not easy because the settlers had settled in a wetland full of malaria-carrying mosquitoes in late April, too late to plant crops. During the first months 51men were killed, and many more died during the famines of the next two years, leaving only 61 alive of the 500 original settlers. However, they were lucky that the Indian tribes who lived around helped the settlers, but later began a conflict that ended in 1613 with the capture of the chief´s daughter of the principal native tribe. The girl, known by the popular name of Pocahontas, was raised, educated in the Christian faith, baptized and a year later was married to John Rolfe, who had a son. Unfortunately, the family traveled to England in 1616 and a year later, Pocahontas died. Meanwhile, the Jamestown colony began to grow with the arrival of new settlers, including women, but also experienced the odd setback as the slaughter in 1622 that killed 300 settlers and an internal revolt in 1676 that burned the city. However, the English were determined to stay in Jamestown, thus starting the first part of United States history. The second part of the history of the United States also began near Jamestown, the town of Yorktown, where the English lost their last battle in 1781 against the army of George Washington and against the French navy, becoming genuinely independent. Unlike Jamestown, where only the archaeological remains of people and an interesting museum is found, Yorktown also had an attractive village with some houses from a more modern time trying to mimic the colonial style.
We drove all day to get to Beaufort, South Carolina, where we were greeted by Erika. As we arrived, Erika took us to a pub where they held a bingo giving away beer. Erika told us we had reached the deep south, where society was different, much more traditional, conservative and religious. She said she did not fit in any of the above features but went to Mass on Sundays. After, she told us that in the south they believe that civil war did not start because of the slaves they owned in the south, but by the federal government taxes apply and the great southern agricultural productivity. Now almost everyone is proud to be American, but feel that first of all is a Southerners. The next day, Erika drove us in her car for a few islands of Beaufort and told us that these were inhabited mainly by blacks, because after the civil war slaves appropriated some of the plantations abandoned by whites. And we walked among several mansions denoting the ancient splendor of Beaufort, considered by some historians as one of the richest cities before the Civil War. At noon, Erika took us to her parents´ house to celebrate one of the most important holidays of the United States, Thanksgiving (the day of thanksgiving). We asked Erika about the origin of the tradition and unashamedly said: The next day, while Erika was working, we visited the beautiful colonial town of Charleston, a city founded in 1670 that flourished with the purchase of animal skins from the Indians and rice plantations and anyil, and later cotton, worked by African slaves. Charleston was the first city in the United States to ensure freedom of religion, including to Jews, but not to Catholics, they were not welcome. We also visited a couple of days later Savannah, a new city with less historical significance than Charleston, which attracted us much less.
For days Alexandra was impatient with the approach of her birthday, nervous to arrive with time in Miami to celebrate this day so important to her. We arrived the previous evening, on Thursday 2nd and we parked in front of a luxury apartment building near downtown Miami, where lived Jackie, a young Brazilian woman who had offered us to stay through Couchsurfing. The next day, Jackie went to work and I set out to do everything that Alexandra wanted to have her best day or anniversary. Without investigating too much to see in Miami (not too much to do), Alexandra led me through several avenues, entered into several very inexpensive clothing stores, boarded an elevated train for free, walked through gardens and finally got to eat a traditional burger in a restaurant. At night, Jackie came to pick us up and together we went to a Brazilian restaurant to eat a delicious steak and drink a few mojitos with friends. There we had a nice talk, for example I was surprised that Jackie hated President Lula, who often have a great appreciation for the growth experienced by the country accompanied by social policies away from the Bolivarian socialism. Then I talked to her Mexican friend with a U.S. passport, who told me a very strong story that had happened for a year and a half ago, crossing the U.S. border. Traveling with a friend, they had a bureaucratic problem to cross the border and were forced to spend the night in Mexico. They ended up looking for a hotel led by a man who had met on the street. But an hour later introduced himself as a crazy man yelling that the two Americans had tried to steal his car. After discussing for a while the boys left the man in the lobby and accusing him of schizophrenic, but before the police arrived and were taken to sleep in jail. From prison they contacted a lawyer of the family that came the next day, but the second night, the attorney explained the situation: ´I can not legally do anything to get you out of jail within 15 days, but you have the option to pay the man to withdraw the complaint. ´ Obviously the man and the police formed a mafia group but the boys could do nothing else than pay. ´how much?´ I asked, and he said ´$ 6,000.´ Naturally, this story just convinced me to take a plane to get to Mexico City and not cross the border and having to face the dangers of police gangs and drug cartels. Jackie had explained that Miami was a city of shopping and tourism, and there are shops selling all at great prices, tourism festival, with several discos open all night and morning that youth across the country want to see; beach tourism. This last aspect of tourism we discovered on the third day when, heading to the home of the next host, we drove through the streets of the beachside, which appeared as Marbella, passing by miles and miles of beaches, very snobbish houses and larger buildings of hotels and apartments, bars and restaurants, palm trees, airplanes flying over the sky with banners, athletic men and women walking in swimsuit. But we did not stop and continued to Margate, near Miami, where Ted was waiting for us, another great host. We had good talks, especially since Ted was very open and did not hesitate to explain his religious past: his Catholic upbringing, his fascination with the Mormons, where he formed a family, and finally his rejection of religion when he became interested by science. During one dinner, joined also by a friend of Ted, they explained that Florida was a very religious society that none of their clients would hire them if they knew they were atheists. Proof of this religious fanatism we see it going in the Everglades National Park, the main natural attraction in Florida, when we saw a plane flying over the sky and writing with smoke different messages: God loves you (God loves you) / Jesus 4gives ), as if the words had been written by the same Supreme Creator. Ted also explained that, unlike the eighteenth-century Europe, the United States was created as an independent country of religions, but in the last two centuries, society has changed and now the United States was much more religious than old Europe. Finally, contradicting Erika from Beauford, Ted told us that people from the South believe that the civil war was triggered by disagreements in the rates, but old documents refer to a view that clearly the Southern states wanted to become independent in order to keep their slaves. That´s when, for the first time in four years and a half of travel, I startedto seriously consider returning home before the end of the journey across America, breaking this long project. It was time now that I had decided how my life would be like at the end of the trip: basically spending enough time writing one or more books that reflect my thoughts and my beliefs. They are thoughts and beliefs that have grown over the first years of the travel but long ago remain unchanged and currently begin to make me impatient to start writing at one time or another. Its also time since the travel gives me no knowledge nor substantial force to modify, adapt or refine these thoughts and beliefs, and at most only gives me knowledge that reinforce or strengthen more my ideas. I feel like the end of the journey through Asia and America this principle have not been so helpful to my knowledge. For a moment I allowed myself to imagine how it could abruptly interrupt the trip, while assessing the consequences of doing so. I got ready to pardon even if not completing a project so important, without being influenced by the recriminations that my parents had as a child, accusing me of leaving many projects at half. I took a load off at the thought that i was not obliged to continue this journey and to interrupt was a choice entirely possible. But while I took out this pressure I was relieved and I looked to the future of this with optimism. So I decided to give another opportunity to the travel and do not make any decisions until well into Latin America. At the same time I raised a new travel objective. Until now i believed to have discovered the principal truths of religion and philosophy and even thought I knew the secret of happiness. Still I have not had a clear answer to a question that occasionally had to take the pulse of the world: how to solve the main problems of mankind? The answer seemed too complex to be understood by one person, but I still raised to think of it much more frequently by the end of the trip and perhaps collect enough findings to write a book when home. Perhaps because of these thoughts, I was easier to be convinced by Alexandra to fly to Mexico from Florida and not from Texas. For months we had discovered it would be very difficult to travel with the van purchased in Los Angeles to Central America, because the legislation of these countries forced us to return to the U.S. to sell the car. So, we had decided to sell the car before entering Mexico and then buy a flight to the capital, Mexico City, because we were informed by various sources it was quite dangerous and risky to cross the border by bus. We had planned to spend Christmas in New Orleans and the end of the year in Texas, but Alexandra was looking for couchsurfing hosts in New Orleans and said there were too few and then informed me that the airline tickets to Mexico City were cheaper from Florida that from Texas. So do not cost me too much to accept your proposal, sacrificing the following destinations in the U.S. in exchange for availability of 4 quiet weeks I could devote to finish writing the book of Africa and try to sell the Chevy Astro Van. We bought a plane ticket for the 13th of January, we contacted more Couchsurfing people in Florida to avoid having to sleep in the van, Ted accepted a proposal to celebrate Christmas with him and we began to put ads to sell the car in Florida. Unfortunately, the last day the car did not start for the first time in all the trip. We call on the AAA and we had taken the car to a garage, where they discovered that the battery did not load properly, and they changed it solving the problem. |
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