Farewell D.C.

Leaving D.C. was one of the saddest experiences I have ever gone through. Leaving people that you have become so close with and will never see again on a daily basis is very unsettling. Leaving a city that you have fallen in love with and a life that is so different and exciting is disheartening. Leaving is a part of life.

What have I taken back to Massachusetts with me are the important things: friends, experience, connections, a taste of adult life, and tons of pictures of the George Washington Monument. I do not know how I have changed, but I know something is different about me. Seeing and feeling something that is much larger than yourself will inevitably do that to you.

When I first got home, I felt like I was back on Thanksgiving break, just waiting to go back to the airport and fly back to see my roommates and friends. That feeling did not go away for a few days, and still lingers around somewhere in my head. I miss my apartment, and my coordinators, and walking into the Wilson Center, and even the dysfunctional Metro. I also missed my home, and now realize that D.C. would not have been the experience it was if no end ever came.

Now that I am home, I get to talk to everyone on facebook, AIM, and Gmail, which is good enough for now. We are already picking out dates to go visit people and I think some of the girls are sending out Christmas cards. My Russian studies have kicked off and I get to sit around the house waiting for my internship to start in Boston.

This has been quite an experience. Take advantage of everything while you are here. If you are on the fence about coming, just do it. Every minute is worth your time. If you have even half the experience that I had, then you are still ahead of the game. Just trust me on all this.

I wish I could write sappier things to make all of you cry or really relate to what is going on, but you will not know until you are leaving. Then you can come back and maybe you will shed some tears while reading this, but until then, I am still here to answer any questions.

Good luck and enjoy!

Timmy V.

Winding Down

Surprisingly enough, I have a very busy last week ahead of me, but my second to last week here couldn’t have been better. My favorite experience the entire semester was going ice skating in the sculpture garden with some friends during a snow flurry. It was one of those perfect winter wonderland moments that everyone just keeps smiling about two hours after it happened. The only downfall was a ring of cuts around my left ankle but watching people fall more than I did made up for it.

Other than that, I spent most of my time writing papers and working on my portfolio, which ended up being a lot longer that I anticipated. Mine was about 60 pages, and took a while to piece together. Once again, stay on top of your work when you get here. It can get very stressful when you get back from Thanksgiving break and you have finals and portfolios and everything due all of a sudden. I still have to write a 15-25 page paper for my school that I have yet to start.
The other thing that I suggest for you to do is make your close friends get Gmail accounts. They are great for chatting and they are a great way to keep in touch. Plus, the program is awesome. I am pretty sure I have talked about this before, but it is worth bringing up again.

I am now getting ready to say goodbye to my new friends. It is going to be difficult, as I have been around all of them all day every day, and we are all really close. We are going to go out to a bunch of restaurants and really plan to enjoy our last week here. As corny as it sounds, we are like a little family. I am going to miss that a lot, but I am sure I will have something like that in Russia. Hopefully.

I really need to get back to my paper writing though. Keep the comments and questions coming!

Until Next Time…

Timmy V

A Week at Home

Surprisingly enough, the airports were not crowded at all. I took the train right into Ronald Reagan Airport and flew right to Logan without any problems, and since I didn’t have to wait very long for any trains, the ride from Grosvenor took no more than 35 minutes (Grosvenor is where I live). As I flew into Boston, I saw shipyards, old houses, rusted water towers, and pouring rain. It was nice to be home.

Over the week my parents had me get all my visa application stuff ready for Russia, and kept me busy with chores around the house and helping with Thanksgiving preparations. I was ready to get back to Washington and my “lazy” apartment routines after four errands. Once we all sat down for dinner and I met up with some friends later for drinks and dinner for a birthday celebration, I began to relax and moved back into the very familiar settings that I had left behind for a few months. I don’t know how close you are with your friends at home, but when I see mine it doesn’t feel like much time has passed, and yet we quickly accept the changes we have all undergone while being separated.

The mall was packed full of people, and it took 10 minutes to find a parking space, but we ended up getting some good deals on some warm clothes for Russia. My favorite present this year is one of those hats with the furry sides that cover your ears. I wore it all around until my mom finally took it away and wrapped it. For some reason she still puts “To: Tim From: Santa” on all the presents, though it isn’t even December. Some traditions are hard to break.

Tragically, terrorists attacked several hotels in India and killed close to 200 people and injured hundreds more. My parents had actually traveled to India and stayed in many of those hotels. They quickly cancelled their travel plans for January which took them right to Mumbai. India is one of my mother’s favorite countries to visit, but she said it just isn’t safe right now to travel there.

Other travel plans include them visiting me in Moscow and St. Petersburg over my Spring Break, which will be pretty exciting since my mom will finally be able to see the Ballet and all the massive palaces and museums.

My dog Lincoln really missed me and bothered me the entire week, and got really excited when a full grown deer (a doe?) was walking around our front yard and then went into our neighbor’s backyard to eat out of their garden. I took about 30 pictures, but most of them were blurry. Matt, my brother, threw an apple out for it, but it just ran away instead of eating it.

All in all, Thanksgiving was a success. I ate until I couldn’t move and realized how much I missed homemade food. Now I have two weeks to finish all of my papers and spend time with my friends. Hopefully it goes by slowly so I can enjoy it!

Until next time…

Timmy V.

Time Moves Quickly

I don’t know how November snuck up on us and flew by, but it did. Most people, including myself, are flying home for Thanksgiving. I feel a bit conflicted. I miss my family and friends dearly, but I want to spend as much time as possible with my new friends here in D.C. How do you talk to people from home about not wanting to see them? It gets awkward really fast. The only thing that trumps leaving my new friends behind for a short period is the idea of home cooked meals for 5-6 days straight, and seeing my dog Lincoln who recently turned 7 (Happy Birthday Link!). He is a chocolate lab if you were wondering.

I guess I am being a bit whiney, and that going home is probably going to be a lot of fun, but it just happens to be what I am thinking about right now. Other than that, work has really piled up, and like most college students, procrastination is deeply embedded in my work ethic (not entirely true since I am almost done with my portfolio). With the fear of becoming a broken record, I want to stress just one more time how vital it is to keep up with your work!

So what have I been up to lately? I recently lobbied Congress for the Israeli Palestinian Peace Process in Senator Kerry’s office. I met with a legislative consultant and stressed the issue that I have been learning about all semester, which is the freezing of settlement expansion and a resolution based on the 1967 borders. It was really cool. The guy took us very seriously and it was an excellent networking experience. I highly recommend getting involved with this civic engagement group. Andrea Barron, who runs the program, is very passionate about the subject, and teaches you quite a bit. You are required to do a civic engagement project, so you might as well do one through TWC that is worthwhile and engaging.

The free LSAT class that TWC allotted to us interns was great. Our instructor is an LSAT expert and I didn’t even mind that the class went over the two hour time limit. I have it this week again, and though I feel really geeky as I say this, I am really excited to go back on a Friday night to learn how to take a test.

Other than those two things, it has been the usual. The routine hasn’t changed much, and I am still in love with my internship here at the Woodrow Wilson Center. I am definitively going to apply here if I don’t go straight to law school. The other thing I have been looking into is getting an internship on the Hill with a congressperson or senator for the summer. Unfortunately, most of them are unpaid, and there is no way my parents are going to put me up in an apartment for an unpaid internship. Oh, well.

I hope everyone enjoys their Thanksgiving holiday, and I will be writing to everyone from Burlington, Massachusetts next week! It is going to be a good one!

Until after turkey day…

Timmy V

A Lot of International Food

This week I have eaten sushi for the first time, and had a meal at an Ethiopian restaurant in Georgetown. I really enjoyed both types of food, and highly recommend them. If you can get past the idea of raw fish, then you will really enjoy it. I suggest either the California rolls or the dragon rolls at Raku which is at Dupont circle (take the Q street exit). The Ethiopian place can get a little pricey, but it is definitively worth it. The best part about the food is that they give you this strange bread and all the food is on one big plate and you use the bread to pick stuff up. It was really cool.

The city has calmed down substantially since the election, but the G20 meeting was in town and they changed some of the Metro regulations for a short time. I haven’t read any reports on what happened, but I am sure that they are going to change regulations and fiscal policies and will try anything to fix this disaster. Lets hope they can fix it sooner rather than later.

This week at the Wilson Center has been really busy. Now that I have been really trained, especially with the events, they have me doing a lot of the setting up, summarizing, and even more research. It is a lot of work, but it is worth it, especially if I decide to go and work there after undergrad. It is still an option if I don’t want to go straight to law school. The thing I am trying to decide is whether I want to work for a year, or just go straight to school. I am basically putting off the inevitable if I take work off for a year. I am going to ask around and see what other people have done.

I have slightly procrastinated on my portfolio/class work/home institution work. If you think you won’t get any busier when the internship is winding down, think again. I am in a good position for getting everything done, but I am under a little pressure. Keep up with your portfolio! Start papers early! That is probably the best advice I can give you. I know you will want to hang out with your new friends, but you need to make time for your future as well!

Oh, and if you have as good of an as experience as I am, I would not push for a long Thanksgiving break. I am really regretting the fact that I made arrangements to be home for a longer time while some of my friends are still in the city.

I have to get back to work!

Until next time…

Timmy V

The Week America Elected its First African American President

November 4th, 2008. I truly thought I would be awake until 3 am waiting for CNN to predict the next president. D.C. youth spilled out of their apartments and flooded the streets around the White House and on U Street. Laughter, tears, and cheering inundated news stations around the world. People across the planet saw Barack Hussein Obama as the necessary change the world needed, and celebrated accordingly. The Facebook news feed went crazy with congratulations from one side and negative rhetoric from the other.

McCain’s concession speech was honorable and could not have been more appropriate. If he had been as level-headed and what I call the “real McCain” during the entire election instead of so negative and rash, I truly think the election might have been different.

I waited patiently to hear Obama speak for the first time as president-elect, and I realized as he walked onto the stage that something truly did change in this country. His message is for change, but more importantly, he stressed unification. I wasn’t one of those people crying, but it was a very emotional moment in American History. To be in D.C. during this time was truly something that I will appreciate for the rest of my life.

I couldn’t stop smiling the next day, but I was also sad that I had to find something new to obsess over everyday. The transition period is really interesting now, but it doesn’t have that same charge that the election did.

Anyway, it felt like Christmas on November 5th; people were drinking mimosas, and the world started to like us again. I hope the Republicans can salvage what is left of their splintered party and find a way to bolster leadership and growth, but until then I am going to enjoy a Democratically run government. It’s about time we get in there and clean up this mess.

Until next time…

Timmy V

The Halfway Point

The halfway point is a good time to start reflecting on this experience, which is a necessary part of personal growth and looking to the future, but also of trying to cement the always changing memories of our past. Yesterday I walked from the elevator on the tenth floor to my apartment, and thought about move-in day and how worried I was to open the door and meet my new roommates for the first time. I have come a long way. Now when I get out of the elevator I am barely thinking of anything at all, except maybe getting my dress shoes off so I can relax. I finally felt, or realized, that the friends I have made in such a short amount of time were going to be leaving me, and I leaving them, to go back to our regular lives all across the country and world. I may never see many of these people again, but at the very least it gives me an excuse to visit Texas, Kansas, Maine, South Jersey, Vermont, Peru, and a host of other places.

By the time you read this, it will already be November, which means I have less than two months left here. Every day seems to be moving a bit faster and I constantly feel like time is running out. If you come to DC, you will know what I am talking about when you get to this point.

I have really come to love this city. I have expressed that before, but it is the kind of love and comfort that comes when you are so used to something that you don’t feel like you are away from home, rather you feel adjusted and don’t think about where you came from twice in the same day. It really comes down to how much your internship, class, and home life absorbs your time, which is more than substantial.

How hard will it be to go back to student life? I don’t know the answer, but I think going back to a less than forty hour work week will be fine by me. However, I do find myself a little lost at home when I am not doing something productive, so I started playing Sudoku, which supposedly helps activate your pre-frontal cortex. I guess that it a good thing?

A great part about interning in DC, and especially at the Woodrow Wilson Center, is that you will constantly be learning about a broad range of things. On any given day I could go to an event on the economy, move on to globalization and then finish up with a bitter slice of Russia/Georgia conflict. If you are worried about losing out on your education by only taking one class, then definitely look for a position at a research institute. You will learn a lot, and most likely meet tons of members of Congress and professionals from around the world. I work with a bunch of them.

Where does this leave my future and personal growth? I am going to leave this place with experience that will only benefit me for the rest of my life. You’d be surprised at how much hands-on knowledge you can attain in a few months time. It has opened up paths and doorways that had not existed beforehand. Ultimately, it has set me on track for a more positive and fulfilling future, and this is only half-way!

As I prepare for my next great adventure, Russia, I will take all my new experiences and friends with me in my email address book and try to stay as good of a friend as I can. After all, I will probably be working with most of these people again in ten years time if I am lucky!

I hope this has given some food for thought, and until next time…

-Timmy V