This week I attended the NCIL rally with a few other AAPD interns. While Iunfortunately was not able to snap a picture with Rep. John Lewis (D-GA), I had a really excellent time. On our march to Capitol Hill from the Grand Hyatt near Metro Station we chanted phrases like “What to we want? –ILA! When do we want it? –Yesterday!” and “Hey hey, ho ho, nursing homes have got to go!” Everyone was so esthusiastic and I was further excited by the fact that I would be able to march with my fellow Georgians. ☺
This weekend I FINALLY was able to watch the highly anticipated ending of Harry Potter (Midnight tickets had been sold out for weeks and as had Friday tickets, so by the time Saturday rolled around I was itching to watch how it would all end.). I also went to the Holocaust Museum near the Smithsonian. While this was probably the third time I’ve visited a Holocaust museum (once in NY and twice in DC), this was the first time I noticed that before the Nazis’ horrible extermination of the Jews, they actually sought to remove individuals with disabilities first. In what Hitler called “operation T4,” approximately 70,000 people with congenital deformities, mental retardation, mental illnesses, or phyical defects were done away with by Nazi-employed physicians and surgeons. They proceeded to gas or often lethally inject these men, women, and children because of their “genetic impurities.” It was absolutely sickening to see the atrocities committed by the Nazis and even though I, personally am not Jewish, the museum exhibit does an exellent job of allowing its guests to see a common humanity in the victims of the holocaust. For me, learning about how people wth disabilities were “dealt with” as well as “the homosexuals” was especially striking. As the exhibit mentioned lesbians and gay men were branded with pink triangles and given the most difficult jobs to peform; most did not survive.
On a lighter note, afterwards I ended my week with a trip to Cone-E Island, an ice cream parlor with my friends, Steph, Koua, Krista, and Emma. We had delicious mango frozen yogurt and made plans for another outing next Friday near U-Street. Woo hoo!
-Posted by Nicole Tay
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