Friday, September 11, 2009

Despicable Wednesdays

Bonjour,

First and foremost, I hate Wednesdays! It's the day my brain and body spend about 15 hours under strenuous stress. The day starts with my alarm blasting at 7:15 am, even if I had one of those long nights. As soon as my feet hit the ground, I have 45 mins to get ready..including ironing my clothes & cooking breakfast...and leave my apartment by 8:00. I'm trying to be the super intern who gets to work before everyone at the office, take 20 mins lunch breaks, and leave the office after everyone has left...well, at least after my supervisor.

On Wednesdays...these tasks become a lot more dreadful. After 8 hrs of work, I gotta rush to Arlington, VA for my Science, Society,and Policy class. Anyway, after a 3-hr class with a professor who's undoubtedly a genius, my brain is reduced to mush. In the first class, we spent about an hour going through that dude's basic accomplishments, which included being Congress' science advisor. Even that guy's humor requires thinking; my 5 classmates & I always have some sort of a delayed chuckle.

After 9 hrs of work, 3 hrs of class, 2 hrs of transporting to those activities...I also got to spend at least another hour on the Metro trying to get home despite train delays :( Hmm...who would have thought it was gonna be such a hard knock life. No complaints though, just saying.

This is actually the first time I've ever had a 9-5 job. Yeah, I've had jobs/internships...but I usually do the bulk of my work off-site. I don't mind sitting down in my office and analyzing data arriving on my computer screen from the 16 coalition countries of Safe Kids Worldwide. It's just that I'm no longer sure if I want/will be able to handle 20-40 years of that kind of corporate work/life-style. At the same time, each task I complete at Safe Kids is essentially a part of the grand scheme of things to save children. Hmmm...save children for next 40 years...OR buy a bungalow on the beach of a place like Thailand and then open up a tourist magnet to support a chilled lifestyle...very tough decision, lol.

Nevertheless, when I was working in France, my colleagues were a lot more enamored to have me around as an intern. Here in Washington, it's as though I'm just another worker :( I must admit, I wasn't expecting that sort of welcome into the real world so soon...nor was I expecting trumpets blaring, gifts, and countless lunch rendezvous. C'est la vie.

Also, how come there are soooo many crazy people in DC? Seriously though, I've never seen such a huge, congested group of people who literally lost their minds. I often hear these individuals saying random, work related things. For example, I was sitting down in front of the Neuseum and a homeless man walked by saying, "No, I will not upload the file online. I'm not ready yet, I need more time." Coming from NYC, I thought NYC's homeless problem was outrageous, but I would have never expected DC, the nation's capital, to not be able to take care its residents. Perhaps some form of 'siesta' need to be implemented...the stress level is way too high.

Luckily, there are a few ways to get rid of stress...

Frederic Yonnet...there's always a free festival going on in the DC area

TWC Picnic

Under 21..no worries..there's always somewhere to go..even if have to party with an X on your hand

Until Next Time,

Emmanuel H.

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