March 15th 2024 EST
Hey guys;
Title says it all; I’ll leave it just that. Diary entry is below, and here’s the PDF version, with good formatting and stuff. For the PDF version I decided to use double-spacing for line spacing and font size of 12 because I think it would be more readable.
9 March 2024
Finally! The first residential trip since arriving in the US! I wonder why it took so long before one finally arrives, when in fact other fellow incoming international students at the law school had been going on trips since like…the first long weekend at the start of September. My flight landed in New York’s JFK Airport in the morning of August 8th, 2023 and this trip is exactly eight months after I first cleared through US immigration.
This trip to Washington DC, officially called “MLK Jr. Civil Rights Immersion Trip”, is organized by the Residence Life team at Indiana University. Throughout this diary I will refer to this trip as simply “MLK immersion trip”. MLK refers to Martin Luther King Jr., in case you are wondering. He is most well-known for his activism on civil rights in the US in the 1950s and the 1960s.
When I first heard of this trip from one of the emails I got from the university, I immediately decided to sign up since…this opportunity, an opportunity to travel outside of Indiana and to have a fun and enjoyable spring break, is simply too good to pass up. It took until the second to last week of February before I found out that I was on the trip. There was a pre-departure meeting on February 26th, in which everyone signed a waiver and chose a roommate. Since I didn’t know any other trip participants, I decided to have one assigned by the organizers. It actually took a couple of days until I was finally assigned one.
On March 4th I had a brief meeting with my roommate. From his name and his accented English, I can tell that he is an international student. I actually forgot to ask which country he is from there, but he is also a graduate student just like me and he studies cybersecurity.
When it came to packing my things, it actually didn’t take very long. I only took with me a small suitcase. At first I was debating whether I would want to bring my laptop, but in the end decided not too, especially given that I wouldn’t have much use of it, and also because I made very good progress on a paper that is due later this month.
According to the itinerary, everyone was to meet at Read at 7:30AM EST. I think I arrived just in time, or a few minutes ahead of time. Somehow the waiver that I signed got misplaced or something, so I had to sign a new one, which is no big deal. And then off to boarding the bus, which is pretty much a tour bus similar to the ones back in Thailand, with the main difference being that there was only one entrance and exit, the stairs were much easier to walk on and most, if not all, window seats have good window views. I ended up sitting with my roommate, which was fine I guess.
The bus didn’t leave until some time after 8AM EST. From then it was a long, long ride to Washington DC. I mainly listened to music and took photos and videos of the outside. The landscape didn’t change all that much, but once we got into Pennsylvania there was a marked increase in elevation which is a clear indication that we were traveling through a mountainous countryside. At one point we got up to just over 700m above sea level, according to the compass app on my phone. This is very similar to the Ngao district of Lampang province when traveling from and to Chiang Rai, the difference is that in the case of the Ngao district I think the maximum elevation was very close to 1,000m.
Originally, there was going to be a stop for lunch (I assume at some point in Ohio) but apparently everyone fell asleep and so we didn’t stop for food until that mountainous Pennsylvanian countryside I just described. There was a small shopping center/food court with not many options. At this point since it was already past 3PM EST I in my mind decided to combine lunch and dinner, but this would later prove to be a bad idea.
We eventually made it to the hotel just before 8PM EST, which was not bad at all, considering that we had to travel in rainy weather. After all of us were given key cards, we all went to our rooms and there was a brief period of free time where we could unpack our things and do some other stuff, before going back downstairs for dinner.
The hotel room that me and my roommate shared was a standard hotel room with two beds, but both beds were very big. In Thailand these would’ve been double beds for two people, meaning that four people could’ve fitted into one room. Apawrt from that there was the usual standard stuff such as TV, a desk and other stuff. Soap and shampoo were provided, although somehow the one used for body wash was empty for whatever reason.
For dinner, the trip organizers ordered pizza for all of us. Since I was still kind of full from the food stop in Pennsylvania I decided to eat only two slices. The pizza was good though. During this trip the trip staff also briefed all of us about the program for the following day. That pretty much marked the end of the first day of this trip. Before heading back upstairs me and my roommate picked up the new body wash soap, which turned out to be just a solid soap slab, instead of a bottle of fluid soap.
Overall the day was not so eventful, given that we spent the whole day traveling. The one thing I don’t quite like about the bus is that whenever a movie was played, the audio came right out of the loud speaker with volume turned up high, which made it hard to listen to music. The trip organizers played two movies, which meant that I had to put up with all of this very loud speaker audio disrupting my music twice. I’d wish there was like a headphone jack or something where people can just use their headphones to listen to the movie. This loud speaker audio also made it very hard to sleep too.
10 March 2024
Second day of the MLK immersion trip. I woke up around the same time that I normally do when back at my dorm. Me and my roommate went down for breakfast just after 7:30AM EST. Breakfast was held in the same room where we had dinner after arriving at the hotel on March 9th.
Breakfast options at the hotel were quite similar to the options available at hotels in Thailand, with the exception being that there were no rice and fried egg options and there was this round sausage thing which was not normally found inThai hotels. There was also no hot chocolate, unlike in Thailand. I’d say the food was quite good. There was also bread and butter, although somehow the toaster was broken or something. Unlike in Thailand there was no sugar, so I had to deal with just the bread and butter.
After breakfast we had a bit of free time before meeting up and heading out for the main activity of the day, which was the tour of the National Museum for African American History and Culture. As the name suggests, the museum is dedicated to the history and culture of African Americans.
There were a wide range of galleries, exhibitions and sections available. The first place in the museum I went to was a gallery called “Afro-futurism”. One of the museum staff took me on a guided tour. There were lots, like…lots, of things to see and I learned a great deal. In this exhibition there were pretty much everything ranging from literary works, to audio and film, to cultural stuff. The entire gallery is pretty much designed to show visitors that African Americans are just as capable as the white Americans. It was kind of unfortunate though that these people did not gain much recognition for their work despite their talent. It was also during the tour of this gallery that I learned about how African Americans were used in medical experiments, and that their experience lead them to have a very strong distrust of medical professions, which might also explain why, when it comes to vaccines, they are more likely to be on the anti-vaxxer side.
One thing that came into my mind after learning about all of this is some stuff I’ve learned in my info privacy law classes, specifically the fact that privacy invasion tech such as facial recognition cameras tended to pick up false alarms when it comes to ethnic minorities, including African Americans. This clearly showed that data from African Americans and indeed other ethnic minorities are under-represented when developing these tools. Clearly all of this shows that discrimination against African American still exists, though the days of hard and rigid segregation appears to be long-gone, replaced by much, much softer forms of segregation.
After this one of the students on the trip took me upstairs to a gallery featuring even more African American cultural stuff and other things. She actually did very well explaining things to me and initially she read out literally all the information pannels on display but eventually we decided to speed things up so to save time. She would end up being one of the new friends I’ve made during this trip.
After this it was time for lunch, which was on the same floor as the Afro-futurism gallery. There were supposedly lots of food options but somehow my roommate only picked up food at the first available option rather than taking me around, and this was when I started to really dislike my roommate. I think I initially got some pork or something, but eventually managed to swap it out for fish, which was what I wanted in the first place.
After lunch one of the trip organizers took me on a tour of the history section of the museum, which was probably the biggest section since it covered three separate floors. As we entered, we had to go down the elevator to the very bottom, and I think there was like a display showing the year as we literally went back in time to the very beginning of the story, to the year 1400. Back then it seems that race played very little to no role at all but of course that all began to change. Once again there were lots and lots of information pannels, lots of new things to learn.
The history section, particularly the bottom floor, is designed to be dark, in order to give visitors a feel of how it would’ve been like on a slave ship. I think it was chiefly the Europeans, who introduced the concept of race and, if I recalled correctly, the slave trade itself. It was on this floor that I learned that there was something called the New York conspiracy in 1741, which is basically an attempt by slaves and poor whites to revolt against the colonial government. According to the information pannel about it on the bottom floor that attempt failed.
The very bottom floor covered the time period from 1400 to the end of Reconstruction. The next floor up covered the period from around 1877 up to 1968, the year in which MLK was assassinated. There were exhibitions about the Jim Crow laws, which were basically laws imposing hard and rigid segregation in southern US.
Basically under these laws all public facilities were segregated. For example you would have separate schools and colleges for African Americans and whites, and there would’ve been separate seatings for African Americans and Whites on public transport such as buses. In addition, in order to enforce racial separation, African Americans and whites were not allowed to intermingle; for example a white boy from a white school couldn’t go to hang out with an African American boy in an African American school, a white man sitting in the white-only section of a bus would not be allowed to sit next to an African American man in a section designated for African Americans.
These laws existed for nearly a hundred years. It wasn’t until the Brown V. Board of Education decision where hard and rigid segregation began to unravel. The floor also showcased examples of the violence that African Americans suffered, most prominently lynching, which is basically extrajuditial killing.
Most of us today would associate this kind of behavior with third-world, developing countries where human rights protection is poor or nonexistent, not with the US. But remember, this was the US in the 1950s and 1960s, and at that time international human rights law was still in its infancy. This was also the time of racial tensions too, especially in southern US. It was during this time that MLK became very active in pushing for reforms to end racial segregation. His efforts would eventually lead to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, finally granting African Americans the civil and political rights that they were supposed to have under the constitution.
The final floor contains exhibitions from 1968 up to more or less the present time. There weren’t really any interesting exhibitions to point out, but at the end there was one video screen showing things from the 2000s up to the present time, including the Black Lives Matter movement and a news clip about the aftermath of an incident where an African American was killed by the police, which basically shows us that violence against African Americans still exist, even if hard and rigid segregation is the thing of the past.
After finishing with this long section (by that time I think it was like 4PM EST or something, but close to the museum’s closing time) I decided to have someone take me into the gift shop. I ended up buying a blue shirt. Then it was just the matter of waiting for the time to go back to the hotel.
Once back at the hotel, it was free time for grabbing dinner. My roommate somehow refused to believe what I said and I had to scold him. In the end I went out with a group of other students. My roommate eventually caught up but I decided not to have dinner with him. I ended up eating at a taco place not far from the hotel. It felt really satisfying to be able to spend time away from my roommate, especially that I just had an argument with him. I think it was from that point that I tried to avoid my roommate whenever possible. I felt that he was not the right person to be my companion for the trip.
After dinner me and a group of students headed back to the hotel, and we were just in time because the day briefing was about to get underway. The briefing was just discussions on what everyone learned throughout the day, and especially at the museum. The whole discussion took I think around two hours, and I shared a number of points. After the discussion it was time to head back upstairs, and this pretty much concludes the day.
Overall the day was really enjoyable. I learned a lot about African Americans at the museum, especially when touring the history section. Some of the things I’m aware of already, for example the doctrine of separate but equal and the Brown decision but there were lots of other things that I didn’t know about too. The student who took me on a tour of the top floor did a wonderful job guiding me around; given how well she did during the tour of the top floor I could’ve asked her to be my personal guide throughout the entire trip, but that thought never really come into my mind. The Afro-futurism gallery was also very informative and the museum’s tour guide did a wonderful job explaining things to me.
11 March 2024
Third day of the trip. Breakfast was identical to the second day of the trip, just that there was the addition of pork sausages and scrambled eggs (maybe there were pork sausages on the second day too, but somehow my roommate didn’t tell me that it is available; just another reason that I don’t like my roomate). This time, to avoid the crowd, me and my roommate decided to have breakfast a little earlier.
After breakfast there was plenty of free time until we have to be downstairs for the bus (which was I think at around 10AM EST or 10:15AM EST or something). The main program for the day was the tour of Howard University.
The university itself was not all that big. There were no campus busses of any kind. This reminded me of the Tha Prachan campus of Thammasat University, my home university. Similar to Howard, there were no campus busses or shuttles, you’d have to walk in order to get from place to place throughout the campus. The first stop was in the administration building where we met one of the admissions personnel. Turns out, Howard University was a predominantly black university – that is, the majority of students are African Americans. The admissions personnel didn’t do all the explaining himself; the majority were just answers to questions that we asked, and there were lots of them being asked by most of us.
After this session with the admissions personnel, it was time for the campus tour itself. Our tour guide was actually one of the students at Howard. She is in her third year, and if I recalled correctly, she is studying health science. She took us to many different places, while also explaining lots of things about the campus. For instance, the dorms at Howard are separated into men and women. Yep, that’s right, at Howard men and women can’t live together in the same building, unlike at Indiana University. This sounded kind of old-school to me, though back in Thailand this is also the case with university dorms.
Despite its size, Howard University offers a wide range of degree programs for both undergraduate and postgraduate, including business, sciences, and others. There is also a law school, but I think it’s located outside of campus. I did not get to ask though whether the law school offers a LLM program for international students, or just a JD program. A lot of the buildings on campus were named, predominantly after African American figures. Apparently Howard’s spring break was last week, meaning that when we got to Howard there were classes going on, meaning that there were students on campus.
For lunch, we all ate at what appears to be a student union/activity center-type place. Since we went there just after Howard’s spring break, the place was bussling with people all around, presumedly mostly students. There was a small food court with not so many options available. The place where we had lunch was kind of similar to what we had back at Indiana University, which is called the Indiana Memorial Union (IMU). Personally I seldom go there, because there is nothing for me to do at the IMU. Though I’ve heard that’s where I can spend my dining dollars (right now I have close to $100).
I ordered some chicken tenders and fries for lunch, since…this was more or less the only option that I can eat. Well there might be pastas and the like, but I was not interested in any of those. The food tasted good I would say; but not much better compared with the dining hall at Indiana University where I normally have my meals. Turns out, the chicken tenders were quite big and, even though I managed to finish the chicken tenders, I couldn’t finish the fries.
After lunch we went up to another room where we heard from more of Howard staff. Once again much of what the staff said were responses to questions that we asked. I asked one question about students with disabilities going on trips and the response impressed me. Basically at Howard if a student with disability signs up for a trip the staff who organizes the trip would first research on how to accommodate him or her and, if needed, provide him or her with a personal guide. That is simply amazing, something unheard of back in Thailand. In my opinion that’s exactly what trip organizers should do. You go out of your way to accommodate participants with disabilities who require special assistance. You do research and then you get an extra person to go on the trip as a personal guide. What you don’t do is to require that someone with a disability finds his or her own buddy/companion/personal guide.
After this session one of the trip organizers took me and a few other students to the library, before heading to the book store where we waited for the bus. Once the bus arrived it was time to head back to the hotel.
Just like the second day, dinner was up to the students. I fortunately managed to join up with a group of students going to a portrait gallery not far from the hotel. There were lots of art exhibits at the gallery. I think we managed to cover pretty much all of the exhibits. At the gallery’s gift shop I bought a shirt (another blue shirt but the blue this time was lighter than the blue on the shirt I bought at the African American museum) and two postcards. Then it was time for dinner.
At one point we came into an area that, at first would feel like an outdoor area but in fact it’s still indoor I guess. The area does really feel like an outdoor area, with plants scattered about, and fountains. There were also benches to sit on, and I think I actually spent some time relaxing in that area.
For dinner we went to a Chinese restaurant. I ordered some pork thing with rice. The food was pretty good I must say, though somewhat spicy. Due to time constraints I didn’t get to finish everything. After that we went to get some ice cream at a nearby convenience store before heading back to the hotel. Once back I realized that I’ve left all the things I bought at the gallery at the restaurant. Eventually one of the trip staff managed to fetch all of them back for me and from checking I still had all the things I bought.
The day briefing was just like before, though this time we were divided into smaller groups. Originally the day briefing was scheduled for 8PM EST but was pushed back to 8:30PM EST at literally the last minute. Apparently, there was another group of students who went further out and they informed the trip staff that they will be late. During the discussion session I also shared some of my ideas with my discussion group, namely my impression on the response to the question I posed about students with disabilities going on a university-organized trip. Once again the discussion took some time, and after that it was time to go back to our rooms, which concludes the day.
Overall the day was pretty enjoyable. Getting to tour another American university was quite an experience, I would say. It is always exciting seeing other universities and comparing that with the university in which you’re currently studying at. The fact that we went there during normal class times meant that the campus was pretty lively with students going about whatever they’re doing. The portrait gallery was pretty cool too, with lots of beautiful artworks on display, and a pretty cool relaxing area that feels pretty much like an outdoor area when in fact it’s most likely still inside the building.
12 March 2024
Fourth day of the trip, and the final full day in Washington DC. For breakfast I ate more or less the same, just that instead of pork sausage there were bacons.
For the fourth day program, we covered a wide range of places actually, unlike previous two days where we covered one spot and stayed there for a long time. We first started with the Washington Monument, which was basically a very, very tall building where visitors can observe the city from above. Unfortunately only a limited number of people were allowed to go up at a time, so we have to divide into smaller groups. My group was, I think, the last group to go up.
Upon entering the building, there was an airport-style security check. Similar to the airport, everyone took off their bags and put them in a basket, remove wallets, belts and whatnot, before walking through the checkpoint. From then it was time to head up, using the elevator. While the elevator was going up there was a video narration explaining some stuff about the building.
The top floor was actually an indoor area with windows looking out. The windows weren’t that big though. At first I thought we would get an all-glass window where you could literally get a panoramic view of the city, or if it is not all-glass, then maybe a balcony area for taking in panoramic views of the city, so the sighting of only small windows kinds of disappointed me a bit. But what was cool about each of the available windows is that there was a diagram showing the various landmarks visible from a given window, and they were all printed in braille too, meaning that these diagrams are accessible to blind people.
After exploring the top floor, I went down to the floor below with a trip staff. There was a small museum about the monument itself. On this floor there were several exhibits showcasing the stones that were used to construct the monument. In one exhibit there was actually a model of the monument itself. In the elevator, on the way down, there was another video narration giving more information about the construction of the monument. Eventually the windows of the elevator became clear, revealing that this elevator was in fact a glass elevator. Outside I think there were several more exhibits/displays of various kinds of stones that went into the construction of this building. The elevator also moved more slowly, so to allow people to see the displays more clearly.
After that we went back downstairs. Then it was pretty much free time until 1PM EST (this was later slightly moved to 1:15PM EST). The trip staff who took me to the museum at the monument decided to take me to see the White House.
The White House was a little bit of a walk from the Washington Monument, but not too far. There were lots of tourists around the area. Since we couldn’t go up to see the front of the White House, we had to see it from the back instead, which, apparently, is where all the pictures of the White House in films and whatnot comes from; those pictures were taken at the back of the White House, not the front.
After taking some photos there, we decided to head back. But before we could reach the Washington Monument, the streets were somehow closed off because the president was traveling back to the White House or something. Eventually a fleet of cars came by, but I can’t tell, even from looking through my camera, which one is the president’s car since all the cars looked the same, but I think this was done on purpose for security purposes, for example to make it harder for a would-be assassin to get the president.
Once it is clear for people to cross the streets, we went back to the Washington Monument. For lunch we bought food at some food trucks nearby. I got some chicken nuggets and fries, and a can of coke. There were no tables around, so we ended up eating on benches. Both the nuggets and the fries tasted good I would say. Oh yeah I forgot, I also went into the gift shop of the Washington Monument and bought a shirt, a model of the monument and some leggo/puzzle/building block-type thing (I bought two sets). One set features the White House and the other set features the US Capital.
The next stop after the Washington Monument was Frederick Douglass’s home, located not far from Washington Monument. Douglass was born into slavery in the nineteenth century, but eventually became a free person. His home was quite big, I would say, and made mostly of wood. Due to the fragility and age of the home, only fifteen people were allowed to go in at a time. There was a guide who took us around his home, explaining each of the rooms in the house. There were multiple guest bedrooms, and of course there was also Douglass’s bedroom itself.
Getting up to the house itself was not so straightforward though, and requires one to walk up multiple sets of stairs. The plot of land in which Douglass’s home stands on was huge. In fact it was so huge that there were multiple buildings located on the same piece of land, though I didn’t get to see all of it as by the time the tour was finished I was kind of tired.
By today’s standard, Douglass’s home would feel almost like a middle class home, given the size of the house itself. But back then during his time I guess the house was considered to be quite luxurious since I imagine back then not many people lived in big houses. The one other building that I managed to see is, according to the guide, Douglass’s private cave/study or something. The building was not all that attractive; it was just a simple shack-like structure located some distance from the back of the main house. While waiting for the time to get back on the bus I decided to sit down and relax and chat with some other students.
After Douglass’s home came the bus tour of various landmarks of Washington DC. A tour guide got on the bus, and during the drive he explained several things about the landmarks. To my surprise, we did stop at the US Capital, and got pretty close to the building itself. This was something I thought I would have to ask either one of the students or the trip staff to take me but turns out that was not necessary. This was the first time that I’ve seen a governmental building this close, and the structure indeed looks really impressive. I’ve seen pictures of the US Capital before, mainly in Youtube videos but this is the first time that I see it in-person, and being able to take photos of it with my own phone camera.
After the US Capital we went to the White House again, but unfortunately even the back area where we could see the building itself was now closed off, so we can only see it from afar. After that we drove to the Lincoln Memorial, for another brief stop. The final stop on this bus tour was the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial. All of these later stops were pretty brief, and the guide didn’t do much explaining.
Once back at the hotel, there was a brief period of free time, mainly for toilet and stuff, before we set out for dinner. For the final night, dinner was paid for by the trip organizers. I got myself a pretty big meal containing pasta, shrimp and some pork/chicken, and some garlic bread. My new friend (the girl who took me around the top floor of the African American museum) gave me some of her chicken too.
The day briefing was done during dinner. Just like with the third day, the discussion was separated into groups but this time the grouppings were based on dinner tables. I didn’t really contribute much to the discussion until I finished eating.
After dinner and the day briefing, we all went back to the hotel. Since it was the last night in Washington DC, I decided to go out with a group of students for some late-night ice cream. Unfortunately it was already pretty late and by the time we got there the ice cream place was about to close. There were also no seating or tables of any kind where we can sit and eat, so we ended up eating while walking back to the hotel, which was a bit of a challenge given that I need to both eat and hold on to one of the students at the same time. Once we got back to the hotel I decided to go back upstairs and that pretty much concludes the final full day in Washington DC.
Overall the day was fun and pretty enjoyable. I was so glad I got to see all the landmarks I wanted to see – the White House and the US Capital, plus several other famous landmarks too like the Lincoln Memorial and the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, and of course the Washington Monument. The day was also pretty informative, especially the tour of Douglass’s home. Getting to know more about a man who was able to not only free himself from slavery but also became successful and live in a nice home. Food for dinner was very good too, and the late-night ice cream was good too.
13 March 2024
The fifth and final day of the trip. Yesterday I woke up a little early so to have time to finish packing up my things. Breakfast was also a little early. I pretty much got the same things as before.
Once I finished my breakfast, I went back to my room to do some final packings. I asked my roommate to do a room search, so to make sure that I didn’t forget anything. Once everything is all clear, we head back downstairs for the final time of this trip.
We boarded the bus at around 9AM EST or so. A few students somehow decided to either stay in Washington DC or go back to Bloomington by a different way. Maybe they want to explore some more; maybe they want to hang out with their new friends from Howard, or something along that line, I don’t really know.
It’s yet another long ride back to Bloomington, almost retracing the same route that we took on the way to Washington DC. This time, we managed to stop for lunch at a small shopping center somewhere in Pennsylvania (not the same one as the one on March 9th). I got myself some chicken tenders and fries (I know it was the same as what I ate at Howard, but I don’t really have much choice). I didn’t get to finish everything before boarding the bus, so I ended up finishing my food on the bus.
After the lunch stop the long journey to Bloomington continued. Not long we entered the high Pennsylvanian mountains, once again climbing above 700m above sea level. I spent pretty much the entire journey taking photos and videos and listening to music.
The next time we stop again, and turns out it was the final stop before arriving, was somewhere in Ohio, for both toilets and food. I decided to go for a Mcdonalds for dinner, ordering the usual stuff I ordered – chicken nuggets and fries, and coke. Somehow the coke tasted quite different; I don’t know whether I’ve gotten the diet variety by accident. But anyways it still tasted fine. But apart from Mcdonalds there were a wide range of options.
After that stop it was just long, nonstop ride to Bloomington. A movie was eventually played. Once again there were no headphone ports on the overhead screens and so the sound came right out of the loud speaker. After the Ohio stop trip staff passed down some snacks too, and I decided to get some Oreo cookies; not to eat right away but for breakfast today. Oh and I forgot, I also had the trip staff ask someone in Bloomington to get me milk since I was out of milk when I left for the trip last Saturday (March 9th).
We finally arrived in Bloomington after 8PM EST. Since it was already dark I decided to get one of the students to drive me back to my dorm. Apart from me, two other students also shared the ride, including my new friend. That pretty much marks the end of the day, and the end of the very first residential trip in the US, and actually the very first residential trip during my study abroad experience as a whole.
Overall I really enjoy the MLK immersion trip. The various museums, monuments and landmarks I visited were full of interesting new knowledge to be gained. The hotel was not all that bad, the hotel breakfast was pretty good. The bus was also quite comfortable and I really like the big windows.
Throughout this trip, I learned a great deal of new stuff, mainly about the history of African Americans and the various roles they played in shaping American life. I also learned a lot about some of the landmarks that I visited, such as the Washington Monument. I would say this trip was very well planned out and put together, even though the fee that I eventually have to pay is just $30. I also enjoyed a visit to both the White House and the US Capital; they were the first governmental buildings that I managed to see from close distance. The US Capital probably looked the most impressive, mainly since I was able to go up super close to the building itself and take photos.
All in all, as I mentioned the MLK immersion trip was really enjoyable. I think in terms of the rating I’ll give it an overall rating of 8. The main reason that I can’t give it a perfect 10 is because of the roommate and the fact that movies on the bus were very distracting, with that loud audio coming out of the loud speaker. But otherwise this trip was a good experience overall. For now I think I can put it as the best event of 2024, but this may change if there are any more residential trips.
And lastly, I would like to say thank you to everyone, especially the organizers who put together such an amazing trip. The fact that you tried everything you can to make sure I had an enjoyable and memorable experience as a blind student is truly amazing. I also would like to thank all the other students on this trip, especially those who have helped me out in every possible ways.
I would also like to give a huge thank you to those students who actually took me out on dinner meals and, especially on the third day of the trip, to the portrait gallery and dinner afterwards. A huge thank you also goes to the person who put in efforts to ensure that I got all the things I bought at the gallery back from the restaurant where we had dinner. I also want to say a huge thank you to the group of students who took me out for ice cream on the last night in Washington DC.
And…of course, I would like to say a huge, huge thank you to my new friend, the girl who took me around on the top floor of the museum. Going around on that floor with you was fun, and you did an amazing job describing the various exhibits to me and reading out the various information pannels. Thinking about it now, I could’ve asked you to be my personal guide for the rest of the trip and I’m quite sure you will be able to help me out just as well as how you did in the museum.
That’s a really long diary, isn’t it?
So…yeah, that’s it for the diary. It’s pretty long, isn’t it? Well for ease of navigation (especially for screen reader users) I’ve transformed the title of each entry into headings, including this very post-diary section.
Looking ahead, there are, believe it or not, two upcoming events; a prom (yes, another prom) and a day trip. The day trip is actually the very next day after the prom. And…there might actually be a second, albeit shorter, residential trip at the end of this month. And…right now I’m thinking of trying to put together a day trip with my new friend (the girl who took me around in the African American museum I talked about in the above diary) and my law school friend who made me birthday cake, and maybe invite some people who live on my floor too. I don’t know whether this trip will take off, but let’s see.
Anyways, that’s it for now…
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