ktravula – a travelogue!

The Nation’s Capital

Just photos… all taken on my first day in Washington District of Colombia. Those familiar with the famous landmarks in the city would recognize the Capitol (which houses both legislative houses of the country, and in front of which each new president takes his oath of office), the Lincoln Memorial (which houses a larger than life marble structure of President Lincoln, and in front of which Reverend Martin Luther King delivered his I Have A Dream speech), the Washington Monument (which was at one time the tallest structure in the whole world before being overtaken by the Eiffel Tower in France and later the St. Louis Gateway Arch among others. Now, it’s just the tallest structure in DC), and the White House which houses the president.

The rest were random shots taken on the streets as I walked along. Around the Washington Monument is a fountain which is surrounded by walls that bear the name of each of the fifty states of the country. I am guessing that this was where Nigeria got its own idea for a “Unity Fountain” in Abuja that bears the name of all the states in the country. Or else, maybe the Americans “stole” our own idea. Hmm. No, I won’t bet on this one.

There were scores and scores of beautiful buildings, government houses and cathedrals along the way which I couldn’t shoot for lack of time. There is also the President Jefferson Memorial somewhere close, but I couldn’t see that either.

One more notable thing about this capital city is the abundance of aircrafts in the sky. From the hotel to the Lincoln Memorial, I counted more than ten aircrafts either flying towards where I suspect the airport to be, or hovering around the city like the few military helicopters that I saw.

The design of the city places each notable monument or memorial at very accessible points. There is certainly an order to this city. And if there is a chance in the next couple of days, and we get to go out for sightseeing, I will definitely take more pictures. I was speaking with a French FLTA earlier today who told me of her surprise and happiness that Washington DC was planned and designed by a French man. “Hmm, I see,” I said. “The French seem to have their hands in everything.”

PS: I have noticed that all the public structures looked really nicer at night. You will see it too in the last pictures of the Monument and the Capitol. It is because of a set of powerful lights placed in vantage points around them that make them look so bright against the background of the night. It’s definitely a sight to see.

Washington DC, On Foot

The first thing I did after checking into the Hyatt hotel and finding out that the registration for the conference will take place much later in the evening, and that I had more than three idle hours to burn, was to pick up a map of the capital, and set out to discover it, on foot. Because of the so many American movies I have seen I had a certain confidence that I knew just where everything was located. The Capitol, a magnificent Dome that houses the two houses of the United States Legislature stood just a stone throw from the Hotel, so it was the obvious first choice. The first thing that I noticed was the not so adequate number of traffic lights. The traffic lights were indeed different in design from the ones I’m familiar with at Edwardsville, but they were not enough. Some times, I just had to cross the road the Nigerian style – after looking left, right, left and right again – when there was no light to guide.

After I left the Capitol, whose interior I could not access only because it had closed to the public just a few minutes earlier, I headed to the Washington Monument. The Washington Monument is a brick obelisk structure built to commemorate the life of the city’s founding father President George Washington. Just like the Capitol, the Washington Monument was closed to the public, or I would have loved to go up to its top if there was such a chance, and look down on the city. According to Wikipedia, it is is both the world’s tallest stone structure and the world’s tallest obelisk, standing 555 feet 5⅛ inches, and representing the dead president’s overlooking eyes over his capital.

From the Washington Monument, I had two choices: The White House or the Lincoln Memorial, both of them almost equidistant from the Washington Monument. I chose The White House first. The long walk across public parks and winding roads to the White House took almost twenty minutes, only because I walked fast without stopping even for air. It was beginning to get dark. I got there in time, peeped through the black iron gates to look at First Lady Michelle’s garden project pictures displayed within reach inside. I could see the South Lawn fountain at a stone throw in front of me. on the second floor of the side of the building facing where I stood was also the Oval Office, where the president spends most of his office time. I was indeed looking at the magnificent mansion in which most of the world’s most important decisions were reached. I have never seen the State House of Nigeria. I don’t know what it looks like, nor do I know where exactly it is located.

I then went, still on foot, towards the Lincoln Memorial – the site of the now famous “I Have A Dream” speech. It comprises of a small building which houses a larger than life marble sculpture of President Abraham Lincoln staring out towards the Obelisk of the Washington Monument. Actually, between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial is a long Reflecting Pool around which hundreds of thousands of supporters and civil right activists stood and sat while Reverend Martin Luther King Jnr read his speech. Looking at the sculpture of the late president did not fail to humble and inspire. On the walls to either of his hands were inscriptions from Abraham Lincoln’s famous speeches, and right behind the large marble sculpture are the words: “In this temple, as in the hearts of the people for whom he saved the union, the memory of Abraham Lincoln is enshrined forever.” Those words, along with the ones on the wall, bring a kind of solemnity and awe to the already hallowed feel of the memorial, and I left feeling quite inspired, especially when I think of the fact that on those same steps out of the building was where the words “I have a dream” were first uttered in a way that sowed a seed of hope whose result is now being felt all over the United States.

The walk back to the Hyatt was not easy nor short, but the sense of fulfillment and enlightenment from the trip gave me a lift that I would never trade for the world.

NOTE: More pictures coming soon

I Was Very Close

The following conversation took place a few minutes after my flight landed at the Reagan Airport in Washington DC this afternoon. The conversation had been waiting to happen since my first five minutes into the plane. I had taken my seat close to the window, and suddenly noticed a short but pretty white girl walking down the aisle. She walked past my row and took her seat on the other side of the plane, about two rows behind me. We exchanged glances, and she smiled. I wanted to say more but I kept quiet. The reason why was that the man who took the middle seat beside me didn’t look friendly and I didn’t want to look like an ass, especially since the lady was a little far away. It would be hard to make a conversation without making some noise. So I kept quiet. But every time I looked back, our eyes met and we repeated the same short smiles. On her part, it must be because she didn’t want to be rude. On my part, it was because I desperately wanted her to acknowledge that we had indeed met somewhere before even though I couldn’t immediately remember where.

Two hours later, the plane was at a stand-still and a queue had formed in the aisle for those who wanted to disembark, so I reached over the unfriendly looking man and broke the ice.

“Hi, how are you.”

“Fine,” she replied. “And you?”

“I’m fine. I’m sorry, but do you attend SIUE?”

“No,” she said.

Oops.

“Oh, ok. Really? You look really familiar. Is it Principia University then?”

“No.”

“Carbondale?”

“No, I attend Webster University.”

I’d never heard that name before in my life. And then I think I saw the man beside me giggle.

“I’m really sorry then,” I said. “You look really really familiar. I know that I’ve seen you somewhere before. That university that you attend – Webster – is it in Illinois?”

“No, it’s in Missouri.”

“Oh, alright.”

Damn! Right then, I could have just disappeared under the seat because I had successfully made an ass of myself not once or twice, but many times in the presence of about a dozen people within earshot of the curious conversation. All of them were white, and grown up, except the object of my tenacious attention. Not that it mattered much that they were white, but with their silence, I began to wonder what they must think of me. And then it hit me.

“Are you a Fulbrighter?”

“Yes.”

“Oh my God. Of course you are! What a relief. You were in Providence, Rhode Island in August with me?”

“Oh yes.”

“Oh whew! That explains it then. Of course that was where I first saw you. I still have you in my photo albums. I know that I’d seen you somewhere before. I don’t usually forget faces. How silly of me to have forgotten to mention Fulbright.”

“Yea. I’m so sorry I couldn’t remember you.”

“No problem. I know I am not crazy!”

Now the man beside me, who was still on his seat because the airplane’s door hadn’t been opened and nobody had left the plane even though everyone else was on their feet, began to smile and looked at me with a look that finally seemed forgiving. It was such a relief.

“So how is the experience so far?” I asked.

We went on and on right there in the aisle talking about what we had done, and how stressful, fun, enjoyable, interesting, etc the experience had been for us. She’s from Germany, and she is the only Fulbright FLTA in her university. She teaches seven students and takes a tutorial for about forty more, she said. At some point, our hitherto unfriendly passenger joined in and shared his love for the museums in Cahokia and the Gateway Arch as well. It turned out that we were both heading to the same Conference, and we were both looking forward to meeting over four hundred others.

It was my first memorable welcoming into the nation’s capital, and when I left the plane, I couldn’t tell whether it was meeting someone familiar, or being absolved of that suspicion of stalking that made me happiest. But it was a happy moment of warm welcoming.

With Love From Lambert

Dear Blog,

What does one do while sitting idly in an airport cafeteria on a Wednesday morning while waiting for a flight that may or may not be cancelled due to weather conditions? Look around and observe everything that moves and those that don’t.

The cafeteria has a banner just above the bar that says “Carpe Cuervo. Seize the day and the night.” It also has four television sets, each showing different programmes. CNN goes back and forth between The War President Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize, Afghanistan and the terrible snow storms that has got so many flights delayed and many cancelled all through the country this morning. ESPN is on the NBA games, and occasionally the channel flickers to the Tiger Woods story.

The food is horrible, and I’ve returned 3/4 of it uneaten. It’s nothing that I recognize, and I should have obeyed my inner voice never to make an order on the advice of the waitress… The lemonade is good though, and I get a free refill while Fela Kuti sings Follow Follow into my ears. Oh yea, there is also this book that I just bought: The Men Who Stare At Goats by Jon Ronson. It has been made into a movie featuring George Clooney and Kevin Spacey among others. Well, I haven’t seen the movie, but nothing says that I can’t read the book first. The woman at the cashier when I bought the book said I could return it anytime within 90 days and get half the money back. I’ve told her that I have no such intention, yet she gave me the coupon nevertheless. It was so cold out today. You should see how many layers of clothing I’m wearing, yet suffering from occasional invasion from the random wind that blows in my direction even here where I sit in the corner of an indoor cafe.

But wait a minute. If a president who has just sent more soldiers into the war front in a foreign country goes to collect the Nobel Prize for Peace in Oslo tomorrow, what does that make him? A Nobel Peace Prize War President? Would his Nobel Speech be written by the same person who wrote his West Point address that signified the intention to send 30,000 more soldiers into Afghanistan? If so, would he make apologies? If not, would the Nobel Speech distant the man from the policies of his government?

Well, I should probably shut up at this point. It’s ten o’ clock and I’ve got some reading to do, and some people watching.

See ya.

The Last Notes Were Dodo-Re-Mi

It was just as well a case of serendipity, because when I went out to cut my hair on Friday, I didn’t have it in mind to run into another Nigerian restaurant at Edwardsville. For all I knew, the closest one to me was the one at St. Louis, forty minutes away by car. But I did run into an African market/stall run by a Nigerian, right beside the Barber’s shop. The woman who attended warmly to me was Igbo, from Abia state of Nigeria who also spoke fluent Yoruba and knew just what I would be wanting to buy: Ijebu Garri, Yam tubers, cans of sardine, frozen chicken, ewedu, sugarcane, and a whole lot of Nigerian-themed food items that I couldn’t find anywhere else. Ah yes, and plantain, which was the only thing I eventually bought since I wasn’t in the mood for any of the others at the moment of sudden discovery. She also found me quite amusing a tourist when I brought out my camera and started taking pictures. In any case, it was another very warm home experience. I drank malt, spoke Yoruba – and the little Igbo I could remember – and had a little political discussion about Nigeria, while showing off my new twenty naira notes which they hadn’t seen before. (Note: Nnenna from the shop has already left one comment on my Barber’s Shop post, which goes to shows that she kept her promise to check out my blog. Thanks again Nnenna for the hospitality.)

It was serendipity because just last week, the class consensus was an almost riotous but endearing request for Nigerian food before the end of the course. And as much as I tried to dodge the issue citing inability to get the foodstuff as well as the problem of conveying it to class in hot condition, I still wanted to give them an experience of the taste of Nigerian food and I despaired in me about how impossible it was going to be, especially since I feared a possible lawsuit from anyone that might find discomfort after a meal, and hold the teacher – me – responsible. But they made it clear that they wanted it too, so I spoke with Tola – a former FLTA (now a graduate student in the University) who said that we could work something out only if I could find the foodstuffs, and perhaps obtain a written consent from them absolving us of liability. It would prove not to be necessary in the end, as I luckily got sufficient plantain from the African shop, and woke up early enough today to prepare it to the best of ktravula‘s kitchen standards.

Wash your hands
Put a little vegetable/peanut/corn oil on the frying pan
Open up plantains
Slice them to the right sizes
Add a little salt
Put them in the now hot frying oil
Wait until it’s golden brown
Get them out of the oil into a clean plate
Wait until it cools down a bit, and then put them all into a ziploc plastic bag.

So it was probably a surprise to them today – the last class – for them to find that we were going to eat something after all. It was not the most quintessential Yoruba food, but it was representative of something that we eat and they did not, until today. Many of them hadn’t even seen the plantain before. Of course, the feeding was preceded with a little slide show of the production process, just in case they want to try it out at home as well, but mostly so that they know that it wasn’t such a complicated cooking process. I was glad that everyone had a taste, said they liked it, and showed sufficient curiosity about how we eat it at home. One person wanted to know with which sauce and which other food we would usually eat it with. It was learning in a new way. I also showed them sugarcane, which everyone seemed to be seeing for the very first time, ever. (Thanks again to Nnenna for the sugarcanes.) I was definitely new to me that most of the people I showed the sugarcane to, even before I came to class, didn’t know what it was. Most said it was “bamboo”. Apparently, having eaten sugar is not always a guarantee that one knew just from what it came. Maybe the sugarcane is a tropical plant after all, native to Africa, Asia and some warm parts of South America.

With this, my teaching class for this semester has now come to an end. The class that began with a memorable encounter over thirteen weeks ago seemed to have gone by so fast. And just before an emotional group photo and final dispersal, we shared a few jokes, revisions, small talks (which included my blog information and experiences), and a shared wonder at how fast the time had gone, and how much we have learnt from one another. The individual class essays from student about their class experience are now with me, for grading, and the contents are enlightening. We were dispersing in the flesh, but the shared community of our collective experiences would live with me for a long time to come, surely longer than the taste of dodo in my mouth – the plantain snacks from Yorubaland that was really our first, and last, communal supper.

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