La Blog de Annie

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Springtime, the National Portrait Gallery, and the View from the Old Post Office Tower

Hurrah, spring is finally here! Even though it still very cold and wet, at least the flowers are a hopeful sign!

Isn't this Steinway piano from the National Portrait Gallery amazing and ridiculous?

Also from the National Portrait Galley... I just like this painting. I would love to make music in a room like this, full of light and beautiful things.

The view from the top of the Old Post Office Tower downtown is quite fantastic, as you can see here.

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Some Random Photos...

This is a Jersey sea gull from the lovely town of Red Bank...

I know, I know, I have posted a thousand pictures of this same shot, but for some reason I just like this one.

Same goes for this one - "the view from my window" - but isn't this sunrise incredible?

I saw this poster on a utilities box down by U Street... nice, huh?

Saturday, February 21, 2009

Caminando en D.C.

Today we walked from Petworth (my neighborhood) down to the Mall and back (about 15 miles round-trip).

The Lincoln Memorial and Reflecting Pool...

The Washington Monument reflected in the Reflecting Pool...

And we stopped for Ethiopian food (the hands-down most scrumptious food in the world, in my opinion) at Almaz, the most delicious Ethiopian restaurant in D.C.! In case you didn't know, it is eaten communally (one plate for all), and you don't use utensils, instead you pinch the food with bread called injera (which it is all served on top of).

I have decided that my deliciousness of cuisines ranking goes in this order 1) Ethiopian, 2) Indian, 3) pupusas (no, not all Salvadoran food, just pupusas :-), and 4) Egglant parmigian (again, not all Italian, just this particular amazing dish).

The Mall at Sunset

The Capitol Dome and the Washington Monument!

Mr. Lincoln...

Spring Is on the Way!

Thursday, February 12, 2009

A couple more from Manhattan...

This street is called Cherry Lane and it is adorable.

I just like this door!

Clare and a Monarch

I love this picture of Clare with her aunties and a monarch butterfly at Lighthouse Field last month. Look at her fingers - she wants so much to touch it!

Pensamientos

We must hope against hope. We are called to do so especially within a hopeless humanity that is more and more paralyzed by fear… fear is useless, and instead we must look for love far and wide.
- Oscar Andrés Cardinal Rodríguez

La calle es un espejo de
las formas de dominacion
y poder donde los mas
grandes y rapidos
intentan aplastar a los
mas pequenos y lentos.
El uso de la bicicleta,
como medio autonomo de
transporte, es una forma
de insurrection al
capitalismo. No
queremos ser grandes y
veloces como las autos,
ni mucho menos
poderosos, solo ser
libres...

As long as there is a United States of America, there will be territorial and social boundaries between it and the rest of the world. What is not given is the nature of those boundaries. Whether they are walls or bridges, or boundaries of death or of life, whether we perceive and treat those on the other side of those boundaries as inferior and less worthy of lives of multifaceted security, or as fully human and thus deserving of the same rights and privileges as us, is, as always, a matter up for grabs.
- Joseph Nevins

If I had any hatred, I wouldn’t have lasted at all.
Hatred is self-destructive… you have to have Love for a cause.
- Emma Tenayuca, labor organizer

Nothing is more practical than finding God, that is, falling in love in a quite absolute, final way. What you are in love with, what seizes your imagination, will affect every-thing. It will decide what will get you out of bed in the morning, what you will do with your evenings, how you will spend your weekends, what you read, who you know, what breaks your heart, and what amazes you with joy and gratitude. Fall in love. Stay in love. And it will decide everything.
- Pedro Arrupe, S.J.

To the question "Who do you say that I am?" we cannot give a merely theoretical or theological answer. What answers it, in the final analysis, is our life, our personal history, our manner of living the gospel.
- Gustavo Gutierrez

Because love is an act of courage, not of fear, love is commitment to others. No matter where the oppressed are found, the act of love is commitment to their cause - the cause of liberation.
- Paulo Freire

The average American consumes as much as 50 Haitians... What would happen if the fifty Haitians consumed as many cars, as many televisions, as many refrigerators or as many luxury goods as the one American? Nothing. Nothing would ever happen again. We would have to change planets. Ours, which is already close to catastrophe, couldn't take it.
The precarious equilibrium of the world depends on the perpetuation of injustice. So that some can consume more, people must continue to consume less. To keep people in their place, the system produces armaments. Incapable of fighting poverty, the system fights the poor.
-Eduardo Galeano

We are not to simply bandage the wounds of victims beneath the wheels of injustice, but we are to drive a spoke into the wheel itself.
- Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Solidarity is another name for the kind of love that moves feet, hands, hearts, material goods, assistance, and sacrifice toward the pain, danger, misfortune, disaster, repression or death of other persons or a whole people.
- Jon Sobrino, SJ