My Final week of the Program in Washington

By Austėja Maskoliūnaitėm, Lithuania

The final week of the SUSI program began in the US capital, Washington D.C. It’s a white-walled city, with neither the tall buildings of New York nor the dark structures. There are lots of green trees, providing shade and relief to passers-by, visitors and residents on hot summer days. As the capital, the city is full of formal institutional buildings with flags, monuments and museums. We visited the main ones – the House of Representatives offices and the five monuments, to T. Jefferson, A. Lincoln, F. D. Roosevelt, M. Luther King Jr. and the Vietnam War. All are interesting and magnificent in their own way. One is great in its greatness, rising as if from a mountain and pointing the way forward. The other, not in size, but in deeds and achievements. His words have a large space to sit with his thoughts. The third is special in his simplicity. The spirit in it makes you tremble, remembering those who have fallen, risen from the ground and fallen again. Reflective – when you read the names of the heroes, you see yourself, the mistakes of humanity.

The museums we visited were also powerful. One of the most magnificent and poignant museums of American history is the Museum of African-American History and Culture. It has a museum that goes up, starting from the underground 3rd floor. You get to know the most painful history – slavery – as you walk through the house, the observation tower and the train. I stumbled into the separate memorial hall for a young boy, E. Till, with his mother’s words, funeral photos and coffin. As we go up, with the achievements and changes of history, we reach equality for women, equality for black and white women. And on the upper floors we admire modern art. I also remember the Holocaust Memorial Museum, where I also found Lithuanian history and a stand dedicated to Anne Frank. The story of a little boy showed how it all looked through the eyes of children, how everything suddenly changed from a carefree childhood, and in the end, after 1.5 million children’s memorial lights, I left my personal message.

But the highlight of all the visits was the 4th July commemoration at the Washington Monument, with a crowd of thousands. Almost 20 minutes of fireworks, not just to watch, but to come together, to talk, to be proud of the achievements of such a great country, and to believe that this country can achieve even more. That this country has a brighter future, that it will continue to learn and correct its mistakes, that people will believe in America and be proud to be American citizens. It is with this thought and this wish that I go home.