We left for Washigton on the 4th of October, Wednesday. The group packed and checked out by 9 am so as to read Washigton which is a 4-5 hour drive from Newark, NJ. At Washigton we checked into the Hilton Washigton Hotel and there was this huge confusion on rooms. Everyone wanted to swap and the Pune girls wanted to swap with us and at the end we ended up in the corridor with a kind bell boy from calcutta carrying our luggages up and down. Thankfully, Prashanto sir came to our rescue, we dumped our luggages in his room and rushed to the US Chambers of Commerce for our meeting with the USIBC - United States India Business Council.

The USIBC is an advocacy organization representing the largest U.S companies investing in India. They serve as a link between the businesses and the Government to encourage policies that would lead to increased trade and investment in both the countries. We were given a presentation by Mr.Ron Somers who was excellent in his delivery and message. I think he knew more about India, truly understoond the culture, the economy and the politics more than anyone of us sitting in the room. He greeted me in the Islamic greeting 'Assalam Alaykum' and I was truly amazed. I mean you have to hand it out to him, he really get's down to your level of comfort and makes you totally at ease. Great personality. For a few seconds I was thinking of making him president of United States. Then I came back to reality..lol.. however, I did a chance to tell him I was a huge fan of his :-) and he seemed quite happy. There were a few more distinguised speakers like Mr. Anoop Mishra who talked on behalf of India and why today, it's the fertile land for investments. All in all, I was awestruck by the whole seminar and in life, I know I would love to be able to speak like Mr.Ron Somers. He was outstanding from all the presenters.

After the conference we went back to the hotel, got a room which was facing the swimming pool and the tennis courts. The hilton is huge and ofcourse a very good, luxurious hotel. It had a large reception, a nice restuarant and a bar on the lobby. There were party halls, and outside garden restuarant, a gym etc. The rooms were pretty too. Two king beds, TV almira, a desk, couch and two telephones. However, they were smaller than Holiday's Inn. I preferred Holiday Inn coz it was small and cozy and all the facilities that were in Hilton were also there in Holiday Inn. On one of the days we saw a gay party. They had worn evening dresses and make up. Its rude to stare but none of us could help it. They had bizarre flourescent rainbow dresses or black dresses. Yikes!

In the evening, we went out for dinner and thankfully, Hilton is located in a very nice area where there are shops and groceries and it's a very very beautiful town. I went to rocket fellers where our waitress Allyson was so wonderful. She served us food and was always smiling. She was so beautiful. Now that i think of her, she is my snow white come alive :-). I always pictured snow white to look like her. A few days later when we were passing the restuarant, I waved at her and she waved right back. Anyone who goes to Washington D.C, has to go to rocket fellers. The food is amazing and so is the Oreo cookies and cream shake which is out of this world. We also tried out Chinese and I ended up eating cold noodles in sesame sauce. A definite no-no. The vegetable fried rice was much better so I ended up having Divya's rice while she dreamt about her 'Dhal chawal'. The vegetarians had a tough time with food because they found the sandwitches blant. I think it was only Vijay and I who were eager to try out all american dishes - a bit of chinese, fast food, italian and mexican. In U.S you get all types of restuarants.