Street empty-stomached but energetic and determined. You walk down the lifeless, littered road, one of D.C.’s party districts. Some trash collectors show up, gradually transforming the scene into an ordinary-looking, innocent sidewalk again. You descend into Washington’s grey belly, the metro system. Located far beneath the surface, it reminds you of Moscow, this capital’s historical cold-war antipode. There the subway system was also intended to serve as a bomb shelter.Your destination: Capitol Hill again. After you circled this fortress of democracy yesterday, you now want to peak inside. Adoration is free. But not unlimited. To cope with the endless stream of tourists, tickets for specific time slots are handed out each morning. Leaving your travel companions behind sleeping, you volunteered to stand in line for the desired pieces of paper. The line is relatively short, luckily. But the people you are squeezed into are somewhat too loud and talkative for this time of the day, you feel. An American standard travel family from Florida is in front of you: The two boys have their fun alternately playing with insects or hitting each other. Behind you is group of senior citizens from North Dakota. They cannot decide what is more astonishing and exhausting; the long bus drive or the overwhelming city. A settlement of two-thousand people is considered big where they come from, they assure you.
You are lucky: You get tickets for an early slot while still having enough time for an improvised breakfast. Afterwards, you link up with Kati and Diana, who come rushing from the metro station, afraid showing up late. But everything works out: You pass the obligatory security checks (the Capitol has seen shootings and other attacks long before 9-11) and after a few stairs you are there. You are in the Rotunda, the center of gravity of American politics, at least architecturally. Above you is a majestic George Washington shining down from the painted interior of the dome. Looking fey he sits on a cloud, seemingly ascending to heaven. Accordingly, the fresco is called the Apotheosis of George Washington. Inspired by illustrious buildings such as the Pantheon and St. Peter’s in Rome, this cupola represents the American democracy in a dignifying manner. The history of the structure is a bit more modest, though. The first designs of the Capitol Building already included a dome. But financial problems, wars, bureaucratic conflicts and architectural changes made Congress wait for more than sixty years for the final version of the edifice’s centerpiece.
After marveling at the paintings, frescoes and other ornaments in the Rotunda, you proceed to the lucid former House of Representatives. Looking a bit like an opulent old European opera house with its scarlet draperies and marble columns, it now no longer contains seats and lecterns. Instead, it hosts a collection of statues, two from each of the fifty states. Dwarfing the time it took to build the Capitol dome in its final shape, the compilation took almost 150 years to complete. Initiated in 1863, the project was finished in 2005. Was someone sleeping in New Mexico or why did it take them 93 years to send two statues to the nation’s parliament? At least they completed the selection by honoring an American Indian, Po’pay. This chief is credited with largely saving local culture and language from destruction by conquering Spaniards.Pondering about those kinds of unsolved mysteries, you head to Burrito Boys for a second meal there. While savoring one of those zesty burritos, new questions pop up. Do anti-Hispanic immigration and pro-deportation legislators eat at this Mexican style food place? And what is next on your tourist’s agenda? One of the answers might be found downhill, along the green strip land known as the Mall.
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