“Excuse me, you look really weird, can I take a picture of you?”

My first full day in D.C. was wonderful! The beds at the Barlow Center are a little harder than I’m used to, but I fell asleep quickly and slept very well, not waking up until my alarm rang at 6:15... We didn’t have to be up and ready for church until 9:45, so I turned off the alarm and slept until almost 8:15 (which actually is 6:15, Utah time). Since it was Fast Sunday, there was no breakfast. I just took a shower (the hot water worked perhaps a little too well; it took me a few tries to make it go cold again) and fixed myself for church, then Valerie and I went down to the main lobby to meet someone to take our group to church.

There were maybe 40 of us standing in the lobby, talking and introducing ourselves. I always get nervous at introductions but made the best of it and did get to know a few people: off the bat I can think of Emily Parker, a nice girl who introduced herself to Valerie and me at an earlier meeting, Becky, a Political Science major interning for the Defense Department, Marie and Jamie, who are roommates (Marie is a European Studies major, and they both told me where they were interning, but I forgot), and Brad, a Geography major. I already knew Jason Linford from a few classes (AmSt 303 and I want to say Physical Science 100H...), and he remembered me too—surprise! Last night Valerie and I introduced ourselves to our next-door neighbors, Laura and Ashley. Ashley is from Georgia and has a nice rich accent! She’s interning for a senator, I think.

Soon a girl named Laura showed up from the Washington 2nd Ward, and led us all out the door to find our church. We walked for maybe 10 minutes and then came to the Metro station. I hadn’t prepared myself in anyway whatsoever for the Metro experience, so my first surprise was that there was escalators everywhere in the street, taking people up and down from underground! It looked so funny! (Yes, I know that everyone who has taken a subway or lived in a big city before must be rolling his or her eyes right now.) We had to get little fare cards, and it turned out that a round trip only cost $2.70 instead of $5, which was nice. Laura recommended getting a SmartCard, which you can reuse and which will let you add money as needed. I was intrigued by the idea but I’m also hoping to take the Metro as little as possible while here. I need the exercise from walking and I like to save the cash. I also really like the city—there’s so much to take in! I wanted to take pictures of every block!

Anyway, the Metro station was kind of interesting. It made me think of the German film Metropolis, where everything below ground is intimidatingly big and dark and made with simple shapes. We waited for the Metro at the Foggy Bottom station (very cute name, don’t you think? But there wasn’t really any fog to be seen...), and it soon came roaring up the tracks. Roaring and howling are probably the best adjectives I can think of to describe the thunderous zooming sound that the Metro makes. It wasn’t quite as loud inside, but the speed was definitely noticeable. I almost felt as if I was in the airplane again, taking off or landing, we were going so fast. I guess the fast travel is probably the biggest advantage to taking the Metro. It’s certainly different from an ordinary bus, which has to stop much more frequently and deal with the rest of traffic. It’s also a much smoother ride—which felt even more strange given the speed we were traveling at. And it’s much bigger, like a regular train made of busses. It almost felt unreal to see such a long train of busses zapping along so quickly and so loudly in a dark, otherwise silent tunnel. Kind of like a fairy tale where you take the magic train to the next magical country. The bus was rather nice, clean, and relatively empty inside, which I liked. Valerie helped me to understand how the Metro worked: Metros go in both directions on particular lines, and, once you’ve paid your fare, you can take any Metro to any place. All the stops are clearly marked, and transfer points are also marked on a Metro map. There’s also a nice time-counter outside each stop which tells the number of minutes until the next Metro, and also gives the information about where that Metro is traveling and what color line it is.

Although you never saw the driver, our first driver spoke on the intercom a lot and was very funny. Speaking, I’m sure, to our group of 40 huddled interns, he pleaded with us to enter at different doors so that the doors could close (“That’s why we have eighteen doors, folks. Eighteen!”) and made a few jokes about how each door would get us in the same spot and we would all be going the same direction. I thought about separating from the group at our next stop, but in the end I wasn’t willing to be the one who took a different door from the guide, Laura. And neither was anyone else, I guess—most of us just scrunched again!

After arriving at our stop, we took an enormous escalator (bigger even than the one in the Washington Dulles airport, I think!) back up to the real world (the experience felt even more surreal when the wind starting blowing halfway up and wouldn’t quit until we had all exited the escalator) and I realized that it was really cold outside! It took us about 10 more minutes to walk to church, but the neighborhood was pretty suburban and nice. The church had a tall white steeple and seemed pretty old-fashioned. The ward seemed unusually large for a singles ward, but when the bishop asked us to all stand and introduce ourselves after sacrament meeting, I learned that at least 50 of us were interns or new move-ins. So I guess January is just a big month! I enjoyed hearing many testimonies shared during sacrament meeting; there was a constant flow of people from beginning until end, and I was sitting in the middle of a row, so I decided to hold off until next month to share mine. As people shared their testimonies about adjusting to change (one girl was struggling with having to move back to Utah after living in D.C. for several years—pretty much the opposite of my predicament), I felt a strong sense of unity and kinship, knowing that we were all going through roughly the same experiences, and could find comfort in sticking together and in following what we knew to be right. I am thankful more than ever for having the gospel in my life, and knowing that no matter where I go, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will be the same truthful gospel. That’s really the best security and comfort a person can have!

Here are three insights I gathered from the meeting:

It’s times when you’re lonely or life is hard that you learn how valuable the gospel really is.

Here in D.C. you’ll have the opportunity to share the gospel more than you know—don’t let opportunities pass by!

We sometimes say that if we only had ____, we’d be happy. The truth is that we are happiest when we are serving God, and the other things don’t matter as much.

After church, Valerie, Brad, and I took the Metro home. On our trip, two very odd-looking girls sat across from us. One had blonde and purple-dyed hair, in lengths of all sizes, and the other was wearing fishnet type tights with many oval-shaped holes in them, and a pair of platform shoes that were about 10 inches high! I can’t imagine how she walked in those stilts! I wanted to take a picture, but decided it would be a bit too intrusive, so you’ll just have to imagine it. When we got home, Valerie and I decided to rest a bit before doing anything else. I posted pictures in my blog and Val took a nap. Then I took a nap and Val worked on the computer until maybe 6 pm. It got dark really fast, but we decided to take a walk anyway before having our late “break-the-fast” dinner. We didn’t go looking for our museums, but did find our way to the Watergate complex, where a nice security guard helped us find the shopping places on the ground floor. We walked briefly through the Safeway there to see what they had and to get warm; I saw some good choices for dinner and lunch, so will probably be returning there tomorrow to do some shopping. Afterwards, we walked to the Kennedy Center and went inside.

Wow! I love the Kennedy Center! In my imagination, it’s like every child’s dream of the perfect theater. It has a spacious hall and a humongous ceiling, golden chandeliers, beautiful red carpets and theater curtains, and posters and pieces of art lining the walls. There’s also ticket booths and a lot of vendors selling food and merchandise from the performances. I took a few pictures, got some free fliers and magazines, and then just walked around, mingling with the crowd. Valerie found a nice set of computers with all the information about upcoming shows. So far I’m most interested in seeing “Don Quixote” by the Mariinsky Ballet, and “Legally Blonde: The Musical.” I will see about getting tickets (and, er, money) tomorrow.

Valerie and I walked back to Pennsylvania Avenue and in the opposite direction, crossing a short bridge. We found the Old Stone House (it was built in 1766 and is the oldest building in D.C.! We’ll have to tour it later) and a 3-story Barnes and Nobles store, which had almost every book and book-related item you can think of. It had escalators taking you to the various floors, and we wandered around for several minutes before walking back to the Barlow Center. I enjoyed searching for random books on their computer and trying to find them in the store. Walking home, it was fun to pass all the little shops and stores lining the streets—it reminded me of downtown Provo, although it seemed somewhat more lively than Provo because of the nighttime lights and taxis everywhere. There was also quite a bit of diversity; one rather junky looking pawn shop situated next to a fancy restaurant with Christmas lights, situated next to the embassy building for the country of Egypt (!!!), situated next to a bright colored cute little yogurt and deli place...I could go on and on. I loved the old-fashioned styles of the place, including the brick-paved sidewalks, the narrow doors, and the picket fences outside apartments. It really does seem like a town from the 18th century.

We got home and I called the family while I fixed dinner, another MRE. This time it was actually quite yummy—scallops and potatoes, a chocolate brownie, applesauce, and crackers with apple jelly. And don’t forget three full cups of water from the bathroom tap! I ate it all, disposed of the coffee and cocoa packages in the MRE, washed my dishes (promising myself that tomorrow I would wash my dishcloth and find a real sponge to wash the dishes with), and, well, here I am, ready to do my scriptures and go to bed.

Tomorrow is going to be an exciting day. I plan to wake up early and exercise, then we have a big long meeting in the Barlow Center at 8:45, and after that I want to find my museum, find the gym, plan my budget for the month and go shopping, buy some tickets at the Kennedy Center for some fun performances (I might try to make the free concert at 6, too!), and attend Family Home Evening at the Barlow Center at 7:30. And then write down everything in my blog, of course :) Have a good night, everybody!