Sunday, August 25, 2013

March on Washington

This upcoming Wednesday is the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington, and this weekend Ben and I headed down to DC to participate in the anniversary march. I'm still reflecting on the day and what it meant to be there, but I feel incredibly privileged that we were able to attend.
The sun rising behind the Washington Monument bright and early, when we first arrived.
It was simultaneously exhilarating to think about how much has changed in 50 years, and infuriating to think about how much further is left to go. It was heartening that there were many women speakers this time (unlike at the original), and that issues of immigration reform and LGBTQ equality were also included in most of the speeches (at the original march one of the main organizers, Bayard Rustin, was not given public recognition for his role because he was gay). It was also humbling to hear so many leaders of the movement speak, from the more contemporary (Eric Holder, Cory Booker, Sybrina Fulton, and Al Sharpton) to those with direct ties to the original march (Martin Luther King III, Myrlie Evers-Williams, and John Lewis). You can watch almost all of the speeches online (I found a bunch here), so if you weren't able to watch yesterday I highly recommend making time to watch now.
We somehow ended up this close to Representative Lewis after the march, which was mind-blowingly amazing.
At the same time, the Voting Rights Act was just gutted, the Zimmerman verdict made it clear that our justice system still values Black lives less than others, mass incarceration oppresses and disenfranchises people of color at astronomical and ever-increasing rates, educational equity sometimes feel so far out of reach I'm not sure my job is worth more than a drop in the ocean, and the list goes on... and it's all made worse by the fact that so many (mostly white) people believe that racism is "over" and we don't have to worry about any of these issues any more. Frankly, I was disappointed at how few white people were at the march, although I can't say I was surprised. I just don't see how we're ever going to achieve true, systemic change unless everyone - including and especially people with privileges that allow them to not have to engage with these issues unless they choose to - realizes social justice isn't an important issue, it is THE issue. It makes me think about the Jonathan Kozol quote:
So long as these kinds of inequalities persist, all of us who are given expensive educations have to live with the knowledge that our victories are contaminated because the game has been rigged to our advantage.
(Fun fact for those reading this who I know from college (which I believe is most of you): Kozol gained his experience in this area teaching in Boston Public Schools and working with students from low-income families in Roxbury, a mere 20 minute drive away from where we all spent four years tremendously benefiting from all the privileges it takes to be admitted to a place like MIT, and being set up for the lifetime of privilege having a degree from there confers.)

For me, the highlight of the day was the actual march after all the speeches. As we were walking in this enormous crowd, everyone around us began singing - at first "This Little Light of Mine," and then "Amen." I don't really know how to describe the feeling, other than... warm, I think. Warm and whole and hopeful.
Panoramic shot from where we were standing, with the Lincoln Memorial on the left and the Washington Monument on the right (click to enlarge).

Sunday, August 11, 2013

Philly Staycation

We spent the rest of our week off hanging out in Philly, doing things we always say we're going to do but then never seem to get around to. We finally went to the National Museum of American Jewish History, which is walking distance from us and opened shortly after we moved here, but took us three years to finally go see. It was really interesting to learn about Jews in America in the 1600s and 1700s, since I don't usually think about them being here so early in the country's history. It was also interesting to see the museum's sanitized version of the relationship between Jews and Blacks - for example, in the section about post-WWII suburbanization, it asserts that Jews left the cities for the suburbs for a variety of reasons, including "more sun," but manages to get through the whole section without once mentioning Black people or using the phrase "white flight." The exhibits also neatly sidesteps the issue of racism within the Jewish community, and gives a pretty cursory skim to issues like Jewish involvement in the slave trade. But we did find a book on the topic that looks really fascinating in the gift shop, so we're going to read that and hopefully learn things.

We ate at some places we've been meaning to, including the new Federal Donuts that recently opened near us - nothing like fried chicken followed by fried donuts. It was delicious, but I think we need to give our arteries a few months to recover before going back. We're not off to a great start in that department, though, because yesterday we had giant sausage sandwiches and huge milkshakes as part of an "eat in" at a Philly cheesesteak and soda shop. The restaurant used to be called "Chink's" (!!!) after the nickname of the original owner, who was a white man with eyes that "looked Asian." It was recently renamed "Joe's" after the owner's actual name, in order to be less blatantly racist, but has been faced with declining business as former regulars are boycotting them for being "too PC." It was pretty good food, but unfortunately it takes us an hour to get there via public transit so we won't be able to frequent them as often as we would like.
In addition to not being racist, that sandwich is as long as Ben's forearm.
In our walking around the city, we discovered that this weekend was Pennsylvania Dutch Festival at Reading Terminal Market. We discovered this because we went to Reading Terminal to pick up some food, and ran smack into Lil' Sebastian.
His baby is even more lil' than he is!
The also had mini-horses giving rides to mini-people by pulling them around in metal barrels, which Ben and I both found hilarious and adorable.
We weren't fast enough with the camera to catch the mini-horses pulling the train, but you can still see the kids in barrels.
Today we went to the pop-up garden that has appeared in the vacant lot behind our house (the one that they use for trapeze school during PIFA). It's amazing how much they made it look like a full-fledged park, complete with trees and landscaping. They also have concession stands that sell food and beer - since PA has crazy liquor laws, they are able to sell beer outside by officially being registered as a "private club" (translation: you "apply for membership" at the entrance and are instantly approved before you enter).
Entrance

Picnic area
Lounge area
Ben enjoying lunch, with the concession stands in the background

It's been a lovely vacation week - now off to enjoy the last few hours of daylight before returning to work tomorrow morning!

Thursday, August 8, 2013

Cleaning out my wallet...

... and realizing I spend a lot of time in places besides Philly.
Clockwise from top left: Bay Area, Chicago, Boston, NYC, Philadelphia, San Diego
Also, why can't Philly get with the program and have a nice hard plastic pass, instead of having to mail out a new flimsy paper one each month?

Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Home at last!

After three long months away, we are finally back home in Philadelphia! The trip home got off to a great start when United printed my name in rhyming form on my baggage receipt:
Caro Charrow!
Then it got kind of weird when we went through security. Ben and I always opt out of the full body scanner, which usually isn't an issue. Except last night there were no women TSA agents to pat me down, so I had to wait a really long time for one to come from another part of the airport. While I was waiting, the guy who stood by the body scanner got really chatty with me (in a friendly way, not a creepy one) - he spoke four languages (English, French, German, and Japanese) and was eager to show off. I'm not sure which one was his first language but it wasn't English, which is relevant because some of his word choice later was a little odd.

After a while I asked him why he thought more women didn't join the TSA, and he had apparently given that question a great deal of thought. He said most passengers aren't "physically normal" - at which point he gestured to me - but are rather "very American" - at which point he used his hands to indicate having a really large belly. He then explained that when you pat down "an American like that" you have to "lift a lot of lard," and the vast majority of passengers are that type of American. "No one wants to be a lard-pusher for their job," but women find it more distasteful than men do. I'm not sure if that was actually funny or if Ben and I only thought it was because we were punchy from flying overnight, but we've spent most of our waking hours since then calling each other "lard pusher."

The other funny thing to emerge from our summer travels was my suitcase wheel. All summer I had found my rolling suitcase to be really heavy to pull, but I figured it was just because I had three months worth of things packed in there. A few times Ben said he thought it "sounded funny" as I was pulling it, but I always swore it was fine, just overloaded. After three months and countless miles of sweatily dragging my suitcase around (Philly -> Chicago -> San Francisco -> Denver -> San Francisco -> Boulder -> San Francisco -> Ann Arbor -> Charlotte -> San Diego -> Philly), I finally got around to looking underneath it.
Oops.
As far as we can tell, something had gotten stuck in one of the wheels and prevented it from turning. My relentless dragging around of the suitcase despite that fact ended up eventually grinding the wheel all the way flat. Here's another shot for perspective:

So, that lard-pusher Ben will never let me live this down so long as we're both alive. Oh well - all is good because we are finally home, and I had this waiting for me upon arrival:
One extra week of vacation! Where will I destroy my luggage next?

Tuesday, August 6, 2013

More San Diego

We spent most of yesterday laying on the beach, so not much interesting to report. Although the beach we went to was home to the longest concrete pier on the west coast, which provided for a nice walk and some pretty views.
What a long pier!
We also went to happy hour at a place on harbor island, which has great views of the city and the bay and made us feel very classy.
You can see Ben, but not the view.
You can see the view, but not Ben.

We had heard lots of people talking about "Old Town" San Diego, so we decided to go there today. We thought it would be like Old City in Philadelphia - the older part of town, lots of cool old buildings, restaurants, shopping, and so on. It turns out that "old" in this case meant something closer to Colonial Williamsburg. But we did end up learning a lot about wagons!
The latest transportation technology!
The happening center of town!
Did you know Studebaker initially made wagons?
We spent our last few hours in San Diego wandering around the actual downtown area, marveling at all the weirdness of Southern California.
They have outdoor shopping malls here!

Is there a Ralph's around here?
 
Just because we're bereaved
doesn't make us saps!
You can buy individual cups of wine at the grocery store!
Skyline
My people are in town
It was a great end to our California summer, but we are excited to go back to Philadelphia tonight. Best of all, we have the rest of the week off, so five more glorious days of staycationing in our beloved home city!
Dawwwwww

Sunday, August 4, 2013

Balboa Park

Today we went to Balboa Park, which besides being a giant park is also home to a variety of museums, gardens, theaters, and the famous San Diego Zoo. It's neat in that a lot of its buildings were originally built for the 1915 California-Panama Exposition, and are still around even though a century has passed.
Museum of Man
Random cool building
Ben has a new smartphone, and the high concentration of cool buildings gave him a good opportunity to play with its panorama feature:
Click to enlarge!
We didn't really have a plan for the day other than to wander around the park and its buildings, and that ended up working out swell. First we saw the Botanical Building, which was built for the expedition and is still one of the largest lath structures in the world. It also has a sweet lily pond in front of it.
Ben in the main atrium
The bonzai trees were his favorite
The orchids were my favorite, because I desperately want to have one but keep killing every one I buy.

It turns out today was some sort of Dahlia festival, so we ended up seeing lots of really cool flowers.
They look kind of like Truffula Trees from the Lorax
You know the weather is nice in San Diego because the park has a giant outdoor organ, which was hard for us to even understand given what happens to things that get left outside for a long time on the east coast. Apparently tomorrow is an organ festival, so today various folks were rehearsing on it, and we got a free mini-concert.
Thanks, Ben's phone's panorama feature!
We decided that since we were there, we might as well be full-fledged tourists and go to the zoo. It was pretty great as far as zoos go - they even had a double-decker zoo bus you could take around, and a "skyfari" gondola lift that crossed the park.

The polar bears were Ben's favorite
The gondola lift was my favorite
Giraffes!
Flamingos!
The zoo is so big they have those conveyor belt people-movers in case you get tired of walking, which was kind of disheartening.
America!

Also, I am a child and thought this bird's name was hilarious:
I proclaim day two of vacation a success!

San Diego!

After a great week in Charlotte for work, I flew back to the west coast to rendezvous with Ben in San Diego for vacation. I knew I was somewhere special when I was walking through the airport and passed this:
The sign says "Pet Relief."
San Diego's airport is practically downtown, so it's really weird walking around - every few minutes you hear an engine noise and look up to see a plane seemingly right on top of you.
My poor reflexes make it hard to get a well-framed shot, but this should give you an idea of how low the planes are.
A shot from a bridge outside the downtown area - planes aren't supposed to be that close to cities!!
Something else special we ran into downtown was this guy:
National Organization of Men Against Amazonian Masterhood
We looked it up later and found out NO MA'AM was an organization founded by Al Bundy in Married With Children, so we were relieved that the t-shirt was a joke... probably. Because the second hit was for the NO MA'AM subreddit, and boy are they not joking. Yeesh.

Yesterday was our first full day here, and we went to Coronado Beach, mostly because I wanted to see the famous Hotel Del Coronado. It opened in the 1880s, and is one of the oldest and largest all-wooden buildings in the US.
You can see a giant golden bow on the left-most tower, for the hotel's recent 125th birthday.
After we finished gawking, we spent the rest of the day laying around on the beach doing nothing. It was glorious.

Here's to seven more days of doing nothing!