Embassy

We’ve judged this building (3301 Massachusetts Ave NW) previously but I just noticed that it is now LEED certified. Is it a big deal?

LEED Certified means:

“LEED is an internationally recognized green building certification system, providing third-party verification that a building or community was designed and built using strategies aimed at improving performance across all the metrics that matter most: energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emissions reduction, improved indoor environmental quality, and stewardship of resources and sensitivity to their impacts.”

Last week Raz looked at the Embassies from Passport DC .

As a follow-up to my Saturday excursion at Passport DC last weekend, I checked out the EU Embassies’ Open House this Saturday. I was crunched for time with a weekend of Mother’s Day activities, so I just stopped by the Poland and Lithuania embassies, which are on 16th St, right near Meridian Hill Park. I live in Mt. Pleasant, so those were the only two closeby.

I am sad to say that I was not too impressed with this event. I should have known that it wouldn’t be as good as last weekend when I didn’t see any line outside the embassies. The Poland embassy has beautiful details in its architecture and decoration. They were serving some kind of perogi and sausage. There was a long line and I wasn’t hungry, so I skipped over that to try a sip of Polish beer, which wasn’t my cup of tea. There was a long line for the food and they were running out of things. I heard someone joke that it was like the Soviet days.

The Lithuanian embassy was a more modern building with glass doors and a lot of light. They had some photographs and artwork on display. They had a beautiful dining room with a gorgeous chandelier.

I had a lot more fun at the Passport DC event last weekend. There were a lot of special events, activities and demonstrations. Maybe I chose two embassies that did not have as much to offer as the others, but for a short walk down the street, I was glad to have seen what a few more embassies look like on the inside.

Anyone have a better experience?

The embassies all over DC were always elusive to me. Most are beautiful, well-secured buildings. But what do they look like on the inside?

Well, I finally got my answer on Saturday when I checked out Passport DC Embassy Open House. It was a great event. It reminded me a bit of my trip to Epcot Center as a kid with the long lines and the global experience. My friends and I were there from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. We made it to nine embassies, four of which had set up booths at the Art Museum of the Americas. Thank goodness I wore sneakers because it was a lot of walking. There were shuttle buses, but we waited for maybe five minutes and ended up just walking.

It was really neat to see the inside of the embassies. Most were decorated in art and clothing to showcase the culture. Many also had movies playing which showed their country’s landscape and traditions. Some even had shows and exhibits. I caught karate and carving demonstrations at the KORUS House, Embassy of the Republic of Korea, a steel drum performance at the Embassy of Trinidad and Tobago and a dancer at the Embassy of Botswana. Most of the embassies also had snacks, depending on how you hit them. I tried something at the Korean embassy that looked like a white cheese puff, and turned out to be banana-flavored. I had a delicious flatbread pastry at the Guatemalan embassy as well. Most of the embassies let visitors wonder around one to two levels and check out different exhibits. Some herded the crowd through a specific route.

Next Saturday is the European Union Open House, which I plan to check out as well.

There were some good shots from the Flickr pool as well – check them out after the jump. (more…)