Saturday 4
April 1981 - Washington DC
We woke quite early and watched TV –
especially the cartoons, which are on here first thing in the morning, much to
Matt's delight - for a bit before getting the show on the road. After the somewhat
disastrous meal of the night before, we decided to choose our breakfast eatery
more carefully.
We drove across Alexandria to an area where there were a lot
more hotels (at about half the price we were paying!) and had an excellent meal
at Lums - pancakes, bacon and eggs at an average price of about $2 per head. It
was a nice day again, although it was a bit windy. There were crowds of people
around, including hundreds of coaches from all over the country, bringing in
the teams for the grand Cherry Blossom Parade, which was being held that day.
Unfortunately, we couldn't get any good photographs of the cherry trees.
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| What a tragic waste of lives these headstones represent - brave men and women all |
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| JFK Memorial |
We went to Arlington in the morning and found it very
impressive, especially the Kennedy's graves. (The Vietnam memorial wall had not yet
been built) I was particularly moved by the text on Bobby's memorial, which
is a quote from a speech he made in 1966 in South Africa:
" It is from numberless acts of courage and
belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal or
acts to improve the lot of others or strikes out against injustice, he sends
forth a tiny ripple of hope and crossing each other from a million different
centres of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down
the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance."
(The strict censorship which applied in South Africa in 1966 meant that
we had never heard or read what Kennedy had said in his speech until now –
which is why it was so moving.)
From Arlington,
we drove around the areas of Washington
which we had missed the day before and then headed for home. I would have loved
to see the parade, but was in a minority and it was agreed that we would watch
it on television. On the way back we called in at Crystal City,
which is a large modern development, with office blocks and apartments above
ground and a shopping complex below. We had a nice snack of pizza and tacos in
the "Dinery", which featured 12 different ethnic foods and spent an
hour looking around, which was very interesting.( This was our first
experience of a food court, something unknown in Southern
Africa at that time. I am sure that this was the first time we saw
a comic collectors shop, which aroused Matt' interest and led to him starting
to collect).
We got back to the hotel at about 14.30
and watched the parade until it was taken off TV at about 15.15. Seeing the bit
we did only reinforced my view that I should have gone to watch. What an
incredible bunch Americans are at play! I could have watched for hours. We had
a game of Rummicube before we went out for the evening. We had decided to go to
David Lee's Empress to have Peking Duck, on the recommendation of the
Hollyhokes, (friends of ours in Cape
Town, South Africa who knew a thing or two about a good meal) who said that
it was the best in the world. Since it was quite a long way over the other side
of town and Uli felt that parking might be a problem, we decided to go by
Metro. We left from Crystal
City and the ride was
quite pleasant, if a little noisy - the brakes are very loud.
We got off at Metro Centre and
walked a couple of blocks to see the White House, which was very impressive. We
had intended originally to catch another train to the restaurant, but as time
was running out, we caught a cab - all seven of us piling in - and had a hair
raising ride. The restaurant was most disappointing and very expensive. The
duck which the Hollyhokes make at home is more succulent than that
served in the restaurant. It turned out that the awards the restaurant received
were in 1973/4/5/6 and not since then! We trekked back by Metro, feeling a bit
disconsolate. The trains were very confusing because none of the direction
names had been changed. We finally caught one which showed three destinations
(one of which was ours) and several other signs, such as "No
Passengers"!
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