UPDATE - April 24, 2009

April 24, 2009

I met a girl from the Eastern Cape in South Africa. Her name was Dia. She was so happy to see me that she hung around me a lot that night and even introduced me to her boss. She works for the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

I was in a hip part of Silver Spring, MD on Friday, and one of the young teenagers spoke to me by saying, “Excuse me, sir.” I believe that I detest such an address. In theatre, I can still play an age range from 18-39. Though I must admit, I was looking rather dignified that night. Maybe it’s my “fault.” I have had people tell me they know I’m African royalty because of my posture, stance, and walk. Ridiculous, I know, but it’s true.

D.C. (government) Lingo

Gap
Adjudicate
Appropriations/appropriate
Stakeholders
Drinking from the fire hose
Acronyms, galore, so many that some parts of the government don’t know acronyms from another part
…

I think I know what they all mean, but I don’t use adjudicate and stakeholders much in my language. I do use the words appropriate and gap.


UPDATE

Hello, from the States. I was traveling last weekend from Thursday, so I didn’t send an update. I’ve had to travel to the State for Round 4 of those AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellowships I told you about.

I could say a lot about D.C., but I’m trying to make these updates shorter. I will say that the best part of being there was when I saw a van giving food to the homeless in the park. Then I felt the city had some kind of different sense, a sense of reality or something. The government often seems like an impersonal machine, almost very similar to a large corporation. And many of the homeless people in the city are ignored. So I rather enjoyed seeing this. In fact, on Saturday (the 25th) I saw it again. This time the group doing the feeding was an Asian church. I sat in the park for awhile and watched them not only feed, but talk to the homeless in groups of 7 to 9. They prayed and sang and talked. Even though I think they had too many people for each homeless person, I did appreciate that they met physical needs by feeding, and that they related to the people. That was nice. I saw another group in the park, a group of young to middle-aged African Americans who were holding hands in a large circle. They may have been praying. Afterwards, they hugged and laughed. I enjoyed it.