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Friday, September 26, 2008, Mona and Fuad and family's house, Washington D.C.
Today we wanted to get an earlier start, so we left at around 8:00 to begin our sight seeing. But first we had to get some food for snacks. We ended up buying 10 boxes of Lucky Charms because they were on sale for $1.88 a box, and if you bought 5 boxes, you saved an additional $5 with the coupon they gave you after you made the initial purchase. The nice clerk let us buy the first five without having a discount coupon, so we paid only 88 cents per box for 10 boxes. Pretty good. It was raining from the start, so, since we didn't have umbrellas, we were soggy all day, off and on. We visited the Lincoln Memorial, Jefferson Memorial, the Archive Museum, the Portrait Gallery, and, my favorite, live sessions of the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives. We saw the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Magna Carta, and the Bill of Rights, among other documents. We saw paintings by famous artists, including Leonardo De Vinci. Very educational. I wish I could spend months visiting the different places. I think if I were homeschooling in D.C., I would spend the entire school year curriculum visiting the different museums, spending plenty of time in each. Seeing the things in person instead of just reading about them in a book makes the information seem more relevant. Because it was raining so much, we couldn't set up the tent, so we stayed with Zaid's family again. So nice. We watched the first presidential debate between McCain and Obama. I thought McCain came across like he had more experience, but the commentators seemed to favor Obama. I don't know how much the debates will sway anyone; I think most have already made up their minds by now.