National Musuem of the American Latino - Bisma Jhamat, Week 2
Semana Dos, Vámanos!
Hola!
Welcome back for another blog everyone! This week was definitely exciting as I got to interact with so many new people, let’s get into it 😀.
I started my week off by helping give a tour to a group of high schoolers a part of the Hispanic National Bar Foundation. The mission of this foundation is to help Hispanics achieve a career in the legal work field while advocating for diversity in legal professions; I highly recommend checking it out if interested! During the tour I helped shadow Jorge and Natalia while also getting to learn more enticing facts about our history.
P.S. I may or may not have seen a familiar face during this tour (aka a fellow YAP alum from my cohort, Fausto! (If you know you know 😉.)
Later in the day I had my first formal team meeting at Capital Gallery (a building with offices occupied by NMAL), where the NMAL staff gave a presentation to other museum fellowship interns who recently graduated from their accredited universities and are looking to pursue a job with the museums. The presentation covered NMAL’s mission and their goals/inspirations for the coming years. I even got to speak with one of the fellowship graduates who hopes to work for the collections team one day! It was quite informational, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
On Wednesday, we had a salsa band called Orquesta El Macabeo visit us. Originally from Puerto Rico, this band is known for their unique style called salsa dura, or “hard salsa”. Many of the members come from rock or punk backgrounds which adds to their distinctiveness from other groups. Fun fact, they were actually performing at the Kennedy Center in DC later that night but made room in their schedule to give us a visit! Even though the event already happened, you should definitely check them out via their social media (@orquestamacabeo).
I also may or may not have forgotten to take a photo so enjoy this pic of my ice cream instead; The ice cream may be expensive but is worth every penny 🍦!
The rest of the day consisted of me spending time with my new work bestie, Teya! She recently graduated from American University and is a volunteer here at the National Museum of the American Latino. Her and I looked over the GM Learning Lounge together and assisted guests who came in/had any questions regarding the gallery. During our lunch break, we decided to take a quick stroll! (As pictured by our adorable selfie.)
Quick fact, the NMAL museum, along with many others, are mostly located along Constitutional Ave, which means everything is within walking distance! Highly recommend checking out the other museums too if you come to visit.
My last day this week was Thursday, since I had my college orientation on Friday (#gohokies 🦃). We began the day off by hosting a group of educators and teachers in the GM Learning Lounge. The group (known as The National Education Summit) is led by museum educators and aims to provide workshops and valuable classroom experiences educators can bring back with them to their organization or school. The workshop we did was Civics and Building Community using modeling clay (P.S. we did this during Washington Week too!) By getting to participate in this summit workshop, I recognized that we are never done learning. There is always more knowledge out there for us to attain, and this summit is a prime example of people using the opportunities around them to learn more about museum practices and share their experiences with their students back home. Also, shoutout to Natalia and Gabriela for a great presentation!
Anywho, that concludes Semana Dos, Vamanos! Stay tuned for next week’s blog all about my community outreach event with Latin Grammy Winner, Lucky Diaz! (Ikr pretty cool!!) Until next time, bizzy j out ✌️.
- Bisma J.
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