This past week was the most fun and busiest that I’ve had so far. On Monday I was an annex page which means that I had to deliver item that were not within the major house buildings, but unfortunately there were not many deliveries. On Tuesday, I stayed after school to speak with the principal, Mr. Savannah, and he talked about how I should take advantage of each day here. It was a really interesting talk about how to make the best types of decisions where you use both your heart and mind. The main idea of his talk was to be as mindful as possible in all different situations that I will be put into while I’m here. My job at work was statement and that was the only job that I haven’t had yet. I had heard that it was a really boring job, but it wasn’t really that bad. What I had to do was sit down and listen to the congressmen speak about bills. When they were done speaking I would approach someone on their staff and collect the statement and deliver it to the front to the recoding clerk. Luckily, I got the opportunity to listen to my congressman, Bob Filner, get into a heated argument with another congressman from Indiana. Later that day I was also able to speak to him in his office about my time here in DC so far. He had a beautiful view of the capitol and I got to take a picture with him in front of it. It actually turned out to be a really interesting day and I got to learn about the bills that congress was passing. Wednesday was definitely the busiest day so far because congress would be going on recess soon, so they had to get through numerous suspensions. One bill that really stood out to me was the one about 9/11 victims finally getting medical support; it was remarkable how this unified people in getting excited about something they cared about through our government. The gallery was filled with individuals waiting to see the outcome of this bill. Although it was not by a landslide, the bill passed and the audience roared with applause as the speaker announced the final outcome. School had gotten out at nine that day, and although that bill passed around seven, I knew that the night was still young. Along with the other pages, we hustled around from office to office picking up papers concerning the bills and bringing them back to the House Floor. I completed about thirty runs and walked at least 10,000 steps. Later that night around eleven a few of us helped with a total of six votes and delivered the final papers that needed them. The building is pretty scary at night, so I had fun popping out around the corner when no one saw me coming and my friend scared me in the elevator when I wasn’t expecting it. We finally left at 1:10am and were escorted by the police home. It was a long day but it was incredibly fun and I learned a lot. Everyone that worked late went to school the next day at 10:30 and it was our first really rainy day. That day and Friday were extremely slow at work, as they will be until congress returns. School this week there has been a very light workload, and school will be in full swing as work starts to slow down. Friday my friends and I went to the movies and had fun running all the way home to make it back in time to meet our curfew. I spent Saturday at a friends house who used to live in Chula Vista and it really made me feel like I’m ready to visit back home. Sunday I stayed inside all day to study for the three tests that I had for Monday.
