I managed, my final morning in DC, to explore the Smithsonian Institution’s remarkable gardens, which run between some of the museums and around the “castle,” its first building from the 1840’s. Mercifully, though the shutdown began the day I arrived in town, there were sufficient funds for the museums and gardens – which I’d never even taken time to notice, on past visits! — to remain open for a bit more than a week. I truly hope that, even as so much change comes to how the central government of the US uses the many tax dollars it receives, that support for this national treasure & pride will remain firm.
Prismatic sunshine from skylights and other windows at DC’s remarkable National Museum of the American Indian, which I managed to visit early last month.
That was 5:21am on May 21st, as the sun was still moving further north; it passed back through this building on its way back south, about July 21. I was out of town then so I missed it. As I miss the sun almost entirely these days, since we’ve reached the period of the year where it doesn’t shine through on this north side of my apartment, but only for a short bit of the afternoon from my western and one southern window. Ah well. Below, you can see both how the building site across the street from me was progressing three weeks later, and how much farther the sun had moved north, by the 12th of June. I should remember to take a photo so you can see how far they’ve come on that construction – it’s moving fast.
More of the Andaman Sea coastline as seen approaching Penang Island back in late July (above), with more of west-coast peninsular Malaysia as seen from the same flight, below.
From my RGN-BKK flight early last Friday: above, the bigger stem of the Iriwaddy (Ayeyarwaddy) River delta as it reaches the Andaman Sea south of Yangon. Below, the branches and islands of the same river delta a bit to the west, where it forms the border between Yangon & Ayeyarwaddy regions. Readers know I’m a total map nerd and LOVE seeing the flat map appear in 3D out my (blurry, for which apologies) airplane window.
(so much world, so little time....) 