10 Miles in Flip Flops

Last week I went to Washington D.C for training with a new company to lead a student tour during the Inauguration. I arrived a day early since I couldn't find a flight from the west coast that arrived early enough to make it to our training and the weather was amazing. I flew into Baltimore and took the train into Union Station, where they conveniently have a baggage check, which I used quite a bit over my 5 days. I grabbed some lunch and headed out to reacquaint myself with D.C. I just started wandering, walking the National Mall, checking out the new WWII Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, I saw the President's helicopter land on the south lawn of the White House, walked through the Federal Triangle area. Towards 6pm I headed back to Capitol Hill to meet up my friend LM from Alaska, she is doing an internship for an Oregon Senator. We went for a walk to see the monuments lit up and then, since my feet were killing me, we went to have a drink. This is when I noticed one of those things that sets D.C. apart from other cities, bars were having debate watching specials and there were crowds of late 20 and 30 year olds to watch the final Presidential debate. I had to get to my hotel in Alexandria so I said good bye to LM and headed out on the Metro. In the end I had walked more then 10 miles, the first 8.5 were fine it was the last 1.5 the gave me giant blisters that hopefully taught me a valuable lesson.

The next day we were in training all day, learning the ins and outs of how the company works, from paperwork to communication. There were 40 people in our class, I knew a couple from my work here in Sacramento. Many were fresh out of ITMI, there were few teachers that had traveled with this company before and some of us had been at it for a while. The training was well done and the people we will be working for are supportive and knowledgeable. In the evening we took the Metro in to get the experience of moving a huge group on the Metro and to have dinner at one of our suppliers. Afterward we wandered about a bit then my roommate, a super cool gal from SF, and I decided to go back.

The second day of training was all on the road. We went into D.C. to get an idea of what we would be facing on Inauguration Day. Of course, it wasn't 20 degrees surrounded by half a million people and that would be the best scenario. I definitely began to wonder why I want to do this job. Everybody had to speak in front of the group as if they were talking to the middle school students that we will be leading. It was interesting to see how many people didn't understand that simple instruction. They showed the p/u and drop off points for the tours and explained a lot of the ins and out of working in D.C. From there we headed to Pentagon City have lunch at one of the food courts we use with the students and then on to Mt. Vernon. Many of our tours will head out there and along with seeing the mansion, they now have a great interactive center about the history of George Washington that the kids love. After that we had dinner and then went into Alexandria for a night walking tour. The tour guide told some great ghost and historical stories that the students will love, even though we had an abbreviated trip. Following the tour, KB, two other great guides and I headed out to have some beers, fortunately we found a nice Irish pub so we had to have some Guinness.

Our last day of training went until 3 PM. We talked more about the idiosyncrasies of working Inauguration, learned some people dealing tips and finished up the speaking in public. I said goodbye to my new friends and headed back into D.C. to visit the museums and hangout until it was time to meet my CouchSurfing hostess. The next day I visited the National Archives before meeting up with an old friend from UCD for lunch. It was nice seeing DB after all these years, Facebook reunited him with all of his old band-uh! friends. We ate at Clyde's near the Verizon Center and then I went back to my exploring. I checkout the new memorial to nurses which is new, the Korean Memorial and the Jefferson Memorial from afar. I had hoped to explore more but it is amazing how big an area it is to see. About 4PM, I headed out to Reagan National to catch my plane. It was a smooth trip home, arriving about 11PM.

The trip was a great success. I feel very comfortable getting around D.C. either on a bus or on the Metro. I met many of my coworkers and met some great new friends. I tested out CouchSurfing.com and give it a thumbs up. I know that I would really enjoy working for this new company as much as possible. Finally, I also know that I still love getting know places with the intention of showing it to other people.

Thanks for reading.