This past week some other interns at my office and I traveled to West Virginia and Virginia with our boss to visit some of the rural towns we work with. It was a very interesting experience to say the least. Monday night we were lucky enough to stay at a lodge called The Breaks. A short walk away from our rooms was what is called “The Grand Canyon of the South.”  

It was one of the prettiest views that I have seen in a while. Tuesday and Wednesday night we were not as lucky. We stayed at a place referred to as the MOC (Mullins Opportunity Center). It is a former elementary school that is now a community center. At the MOC we had Red Cross cots to sleep on and the showers were in former janitors' closets. To make matters worse, our boss told us we didn’t need anything, so none of us had blankets, pillows, or even towels! I am not a girly girl, and I did live in a tent for two summers, but showering in janitors closets is not something I want to do! At least the mountains around the MOC made for very pretty morning runs. 

One afternoon in West Virginia we visited the largest arch bridge in the Western hemisphere, the New River Gorge Bridge.

Driving across it was nothing special, but going underneath the bridge was a very cool experience!
       
Traveling this past week to the communities we work with made me so grateful for my family and all they do for me!

Things are finally settling down, as my roommates and I are getting used to the city and have finally started working. Last weekend I was lucky enough to go to the apartment of one of my dad’s business acquaintances for a Shabbat dinner. My roommates were more scared than I was about the fact that I was going to a stranger's house, but I tried to tell them how Jewish people LOVE feeding anyone! There ended up being about ten people at the dinner, lots of food and drinks, and I made a few new friends.  Saturday I was able to make it down to the beach volleyball courts again. I met one of the regulars, so hopefully I will have an in to play in some of the tournaments there this summer!

Rather than working on Friday afternoons, my boss gives the other interns and I a place to visit. It is a good way to start the weekend. So, last Friday he sent us to Ben’s Chili Bowl on U street which is known for Obama and Bill Cosby eating there!

I would highly recommend visiting Ben’s at least once. It is a well established Washington restaurant that is worth the long line and craziness. In continuing with my never ending search for good coffee, I still have not found a cute, good coffee shop that I love. However, I did try McDonald’s iced coffee this morning and it turned out to be almost as good as Dunkin Donuts!

I can’t believe that I have been here for two weeks already. It has gone by so fast! I finally started work on Tuesday, but before I started I made sure to fit in a few more adventures. Thursday was my birthday, so one of the interns I work with made lunch for me and we hung out by the pool all day which was so relaxing in a crazy city. In my never ending quest for a Dunkin Donuts (Starbucks and Caribou Coffee are just not cutting it), I ventured into Chinatown which is just a few stops over on the Metro from my apartment. It must have been my lucky weekend because two days in a row I got an iced coffee for 99 cents :)! Chinatown also has tons of good shopping and food. I found an Urban Outfitters, City Sports, Fuddruckers, Potbelly’s, and Dunkin all on the same block!

             

In addition to Chinatown, I made sure to check out Dupont Circle. All week I had been hearing about this amazing cupcake store, Hello Cupcake, so I decided to go visit it. The store was cute with a few little tables to sit at, a daily cupcake menu, and pretty cupcakes 

but I think I had hyped myself up for it so much by imagining a giant store with huge, oversized cupcakes all over that I was a little disappointed.

            

In keeping with the food theme, my roommate and I visited Five Guys for the first time. It is just a few blocks over from our apartment. Getting a burger and fries there is a must! Just one order of fries is big enough for two people to share. Somehow, however, my roommate and I ended up with four large orders of fries! 

  

We ended up sharing them with the concierge guy at our apartment. *If there is one person you want to be cool with, make sure its the concierge. He will help you out with anything you need!*

           

Tuesday I finally started work. It has been pretty slow this week because we just have a lot of background reading to do and are still working on getting cleared by security. According to my boss, the government moves slower than icebergs. Next week, we are traveling to mining towns in Virginia and West Virginia for the week, so I am sure I will have lots to write about then!

I have been fortunate enough to have traveled a lot of places during high school and college. However, I have never experienced the amount of diversity, and enthusiasm for embracing it, as I have at The Washington Center. Just my apartment has me (a Russian Jew), my roommate, Jess, who is from Barbados

and our other two roommates, who are from South Korea and Mexico. In just our apartment alone, three languages are spoken!

Our week here started off pretty slow with the usual orientation activities and introductions. When we finally had a whole day free, Jess and I decided to go sightseeing with a few of our friends from home. We hit up the usual places such as the Washington Monument, Lincoln Memorial, etc... In one of our seemingly endless searches for a bathroom (its harder than you think to find a good, clean bathroom, especially as a girl), Jess and I stumbled upon a cute food court in the lower level of the Ronald Reagan Building, which houses the U.S. Agency for International Development and other offices. The food court had a painted elephant and donkey,

which I was lucky to find, since my mom and I love going to find the painted animals many cities have featured (my aunt even has one of the painted cows in her garden!).

Instead of work this week, I am one of the lucky (and extremely bored) few who are starting next week. So, a couple of the interns who I am working with and I visited the U.S. Capitol Visitor Center and the U.S. Botanic Gardens. The Visitor Center turned out to be pretty boring. I did learn, however, that the capitol does not have an address. The botanic garden, on the other hand, was mesmerizing. I was not expecting to enjoy it so much. They had rooms dedicated to jungle plants, desert plants, rare and endangered plants, and so much more. The jungle room had stairs you could climb up to the top so you could look down on the canopy of trees! Even if you are not a plant person I would recommend going to the Botanic Gardens; you will be surprised how much you will enjoy them.