VISITING DOMINICAN REPUBLIC WITH NEREYDA BEAN

The Beans in Isla Saona, Dominican Republic

Nereyda Bean knows a lot about the Dominican Republic a country which has a lot of things in common with Cyprus, her coutry: it's an island with centuries of history and witness of different cultures, languages and people.

Thanks to her work as an air hostess, she travels a lot around the world and she has visited Dominican Republic lots of times. Nereyda has been the best guide to visit this wonderful country and know the most interesting things about it.

The Dominican Republic or República Dominicana is a sovereign state located in the island of Hispaniola, in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean region. It occupies the eastern five-eighths of the island, which it shares with the nation of Haiti, making Hispaniola one of two Caribbean islands, along with Saint Martin, that are shared by two countries.

More information: Go Dominican Republic

Nereyda Bean seeing the whales

The Dominican Republic is the second-largest Caribbean nation by area, after Cuba, at 48,445 square kilometers, and third by population with approximately 10 million people, of which approximately three million live in the metropolitan area of Santo Domingo, the capital city.

The Dominican Republic is the most visited destination in the Caribbean. The year-round golf courses are major attractions. A geographically diverse nation, the Dominican Republic is home to both the Caribbean's tallest mountain peak, Pico Duarte, and the Caribbean's largest lake and point of lowest elevation, Lake Enriquillo. 

The island has an average temperature of 26 °C  and great climatic and biological diversity. The country is also the site of the first cathedral, castle, monastery, and fortress built in the Americas, located in Santo Domingo's Colonial Zone, a World Heritage Site. Music and sport are of great importance in the Dominican culture, with Merengue and Bachata as the national dance and music, and baseball as the favorite sport.

More information: Lonely Planet

The Beans in Samaná, Dominican Republic

The Arawakan-speaking Taíno moved into Hispaniola from the north east region of what is now known as South America, displacing earlier inhabitants, c. AD 650. They engaged in farming and fishing and hunting and gathering. The fierce Caribs drove the Taíno to the northeastern Caribbean during much of the 15th century. The estimates of Hispaniola's population in 1492 vary widely, including one hundred thousand, three hundred thousand, and four hundred thousand to two million. Determining precisely how many people lived on the island in pre-Columbian times is next to impossible, as no accurate records exist. By 1492 the island was divided into five Taíno chiefdoms. The Taíno name for the entire island was either Ayiti or Quisqueya.

The Spaniards arrived in 1492. After initially friendly relationships, the Taínos resisted the conquest, led by the female Chief Anacaona of Xaragua and her ex-husband Chief Caonabo of Maguana, as well as Chiefs Guacanagaríx, Guamá, Hatuey, and Enriquillo.

More information: UNESCO

The Beans in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic

The latter's successes gained his people an autonomous enclave for a time on the island. Within a few years after 1492 the population of Taínos had declined drastically, due to smallpox, measles, and other diseases that arrived with the Europeans, and from other causes discussed below.

The first recorded smallpox outbreak in the Americas occurred on Hispaniola in 1507. The last record of pure Taínos in the country was from 1864. Still, Taíno biological heritage survived to an important extent, due to intermixing. Census records from 1514 reveal that 40% of Spanish men in Santo Domingo were married to Taino women, and some present-day Dominicans have Taíno ancestry. Remnants of the Taino culture include their cave paintings, as well as pottery designs which are still used in the small artisan village of Higüerito, Moca.

More information: Taino Gallery 

When I was living in the Dominican Republic, 

the local kids became a part of my family. 

Maika Monroe

ELI BOND-BEAN'S BIRTHDAY IN DOMINICAN REPUBLIC

The Beans celebrating Eli's Birthday

The Beans have had an intensive day today. They have just arrived to Santo Domingo, the capital of Dominican Republic and they have gone directly to the hotel to rest a little before starting their English classes.

They have revised the Future with Going to and Countable and Uncountable with Much, Many and A lot of before celebrating Eli Bond-Bean's Birthday. It has been a fantastic morning full of happiness and joyful.

More information: Going to

Next, Nereyda Bean has invited the family to know lots of things about Dominican Republic: its sights, its landscapes, its food, its history... and the most important and beautiful, its people.

More information: Much, Many, A lot of

After this wonderful trip, the family has been talking about this Caribbean country and they have played a little to enjoy this unforgettable day.

You don't get older, you get better. 

Shirley Bassey

NEW ORLEANS: ENJOYING BLUES & THE CREOLE CULTURE

Nereyda, Maria and Ana's wishes

Today, The Beans have visited New Orleans in Lousiana. They are excited with this trip because they love blues and jazz and they want to know more things about the Creole culture which has great roots in this city.

More information: May

The family has revised the future of probabilities with May and has started to talk about Countable and Uncountable and some kinds of containers.

Paqui Bean is a little sad because his last Amish friend has decided to begin a new path far away the family and The Beans have dedicated some wonderful wishes and hopes to him in a local way.

Finally, the family has finished a new chapter of Christmas Carol and they have reviewed numbers with two intensive bingos and letters with the IATA codes, in an attempt to choose their last destination.

More information: Countable & Uncountable

New Orleans is a major United States port and the largest city and metropolitan area in the state of Louisiana. The population of the city was 343,829 as of the 2010 U.S. Census. Before Hurricane Katrina, Orleans Parish was the most populous parish in Louisiana. As of 2015, it ranked third, trailing neighboring Jefferson Parish and East Baton Rouge Parish.

The city is known for its distinct French and Spanish Creole architecture, as well as its cross-cultural and multilingual heritage. New Orleans is famous for its cuisine, music -particularly as the birthplace of jazz- and its annual celebrations and festivals, most notably Mardi Gras. The city is often referred to as the most unique in the United States.

Manuel Bean playing Bingo

New Orleans is located in southeastern Louisiana, and occupies both sides of the Mississippi River. The heart of the city and its French Quarter is on the river's north side. The city and Orleans Parish, in French paroisse d'Orléans, are coterminous. The city and parish are bounded by the parishes of St. Tammany to the north, St. Bernard to the east, Plaquemines to the south, and Jefferson to the south and west. Lake Pontchartrain, part of lies within the city limits, lies to the north and Lake Borgne lies to the east.

As a port New Orleans played a major role during the antebellum era in the Atlantic slave trade. The port handled commodities for export from the interior and imported goods from other countries, which were warehoused and transferred in New Orleans to smaller vessels and distributed along the Mississippi River watershed. The river was filled with steamboats, flatboats and sailing ships. Despite its role in the slave trade, New Orleans at the time had the largest and most prosperous community of free persons of color in the nation, who were often educated, middle-class property owners.

The Civil Rights Movement's success in gaining federal passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 renewed constitutional rights, including voting for blacks. Together, these resulted in the most far-reaching changes in New Orleans' 20th century history. 

The Beans visiting Southern Charm in New Orleans

Though legal and civil equality were re-established by the end of the 1960s, a large gap in income levels and educational attainment persisted between the city's White and African-American communities.

New Orleans was catastrophically affected when the Federal levee system failed during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. As the hurricane passed through the Gulf Coast region, the city's federal flood protection system failed, resulting in the worst civil engineering disaster in American history. Floodwalls and levees constructed by the United States Army Corps of Engineers failed below design specifications and 80% of the city flooded. 

More than 1,500 people were recorded as having died in Louisiana, most in New Orleans, while others remain unaccounted for. Before Hurricane Katrina, the city called for the first mandatory evacuation in its history, to be followed by another mandatory evacuation three years later with Hurricane Gustav.

More information: New Orleans on Line

Live as if you were to die tomorrow. 

Learn as if you were to live forever. 

Mahatma Gandhi

CAPE CANAVERAL: EXPLORING THE SPACE FROM FLORIDA

Natalia Bean at Kennedy Space Center

Today, The Beans have visited Cape Canaveral in Florida. After leaving Washington D.C., the family has travelled to the south to visit this important place, headquarter of the Kennedy Space Center.  

Natalia Bean, who is the astronaut of the family, has enjoyed this trip especially and she has been talking to her family about the importance of the occupational hazards in this difficult profession where they have to do some routines and activities to be ready to drive into space.

Download Glosary of Safety Terminology

Cape Canaveral, from the Spanish Cabo Cañaveral, is a cape in Brevard County, Florida, near the center of the state's Atlantic coast. Known as Cape Kennedy from 1963 to 1973, it lies east of Merritt Island, separated from it by the Banana River. It was discovered by the Spanish conquistador Juan Ponce de León in 1513.

It is part of a region known as the Space Coast, and is the site of the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Since many U.S. spacecraft have been launched from both the station and the Kennedy Space Center on adjacent Merritt Island, the two are sometimes conflated with each other. In homage to its spacefaring heritage, the Florida Public Service Commission allocated area code 321, as in a launch countdown, to the Cape Canaveral area.

Download Space Exploration by The Grandma

The Beans visit the Kennedy Space Center

Other features of the cape include the Cape Canaveral lighthouse and Port Canaveral, one of the busiest cruise ports in the world. 

The city of Cape Canaveral lies just south of the Port Canaveral District. 

Mosquito Lagoon, the Indian River, Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge and Canaveral National Seashore are also features of this area.

Cape Canaveral became the test site for missiles when the legislation for the Joint Long Range Proving Ground was passed by the 81st Congress and signed by President Harry Truman on May 11, 1949. Work began on May 9, 1950, under a contract with the Duval Engineering Company of Jacksonville, Florida, to build the Cape's first paved access road and its first permanent launch site.

More information: Kennedy Space Center

The first rocket launched at the Cape was a V-2 rocket named Bumper 8 from Launch Complex 3 on July 24, 1950. On February 6, 1959, the first successful test firing of a Titan intercontinental ballistic missile was accomplished. NASA's Project Mercury and Gemini space flights were launched from Cape Canaveral, as were Apollo flights using the Saturn I and Saturn IB rockets.

Cape Canaveral was chosen for rocket launches to take advantage of the Earth's rotation. The linear velocity of the Earth's surface is greatest towards the equator; the relatively southerly location of the cape allows rockets to take advantage of this by launching eastward, in the same direction as the Earth's rotation.

More information: NASA

An astronaut in a space mission

It is also highly desirable to have the downrange area sparsely populated, in case of accidents; an ocean is ideal for this. The east coast of Florida has logistical advantages over potential competing sites. The Spaceport Florida Launch Complex 46 of the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station is the easternmost near the tip of the cape.

From 1963 to 1973, the area had a different name when President Lyndon Johnson by executive order renamed the area Cape Kennedy after President John F. Kennedy, who had set the goal of landing on the moon. After Kennedy's assassination in November 1963, his widow, Jacqueline Kennedy, suggested to President Johnson that renaming the Cape Canaveral facility would be an appropriate memorial. Johnson recommended the renaming of the entire cape, announced in a televised address six days after the assassination, on Thanksgiving evening.

More information: Space Coast Launches

Accordingly, Cape Canaveral was officially renamed Cape Kennedy. Kennedy's last visit to the space facility was on November 16, six days before his death; the final Mercury mission had concluded six months earlier.

Science has not yet mastered prophecy. We predict too much for the next year and yet far too little for the next 10. 

Neil Armstrong

WASHINGTON, D.C., THE AMERICAN IDIOSYNCRASY

The Beans arriving to the Treasury Building

Yesterday, The Beans said goodbye to Washington, D.C. They chose the last places to visit and they have a closer relationship with the idiosyncrasy of the country. 

For one hand, they visited the Treasury Building, symbol of the economical power in the country which represents better the idea of capitalism. 

For other hand, the family visited Arlington Cemetery, symbol of the politican and military power of the USA.

Finally, The Grandma wanted to visit the Lincoln Memorial to tribute Abraham Lincoln and to remember another important figure of the recent American history: Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Treasury Building in Washington, D.C., is a National Historic Landmark building which is the headquarters of the United States Department of the Treasury. An image of the Treasury Building is featured on the back of the United States ten-dollar bill.

In the spring of the year 1800, the capital of the United States was preparing to move from the well-established city of Philadelphia to a parcel of tidewater land along the Potomac River. President John Adams issued an Executive Order on May 15th instructing the federal government to move to Washington and to be open for business by June 15, 1800. Arriving in Washington, relocated government employees found only one building completed and ready to be occupied: the Treasury Department building. The building was 147 feet long and 57 feet wide, flanking the south-east end of the White House.

More information: U.S.Department of the Treasury

Arlington National Cemetery is a United States military cemetery in Arlington County, Virginia, across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C., in whose 253 ha the dead of the nation's conflicts have been buried, beginning with the Civil War, as well as reinterred dead from earlier wars. The United States Department of the Army, a component of the United States Department of Defense, controls the cemetery. The national cemetery was established during the Civil War on the grounds of Arlington House, which had been the estate of the family of Confederate general Robert E. Lee's wife Mary Anna (Custis) Lee, a great-granddaughter of Martha Washington.

More information: Arlington Cemetery

The Lincoln Memorial is an American national monument built to honor the 16th President of the United States, Abraham Lincoln. It is located on the western end of the National Mall in Washington, D.C., across from the Washington Monument. Dedicated in 1922, it is one of several monuments built to honor an American president. It has always been a major tourist attraction and since the 1930s has been a symbolic center focused on race relations.

Grandma's memories with Martin Luther King, Jr.

The building is in the form of a Greek Doric temple and contains a large seated sculpture of Abraham Lincoln and inscriptions of two well-known speeches by Lincoln, The Gettysburg Address and his Second Inaugural Address. 

The memorial has been the site of many famous speeches, including Martin Luther King Jr.'s I Have a Dream speech, delivered on August 28, 1963, during the rally at the end of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.

Like other monuments on the National Mall, the memorial is administered by the National Park Service under its National Mall and Memorial Parks group.

More information: Lincoln Memorial

I got my story, my dream, from America. 

The hero I had is Forrest Gump... I like that guy.
 

Jack Ma

THE AMERICAN INDIANS, THE REAL TREASURE OF THE USA

The Beans visit the NMAI in Washington D.C.

Today, The Beans have visited The National Museum of the American Indian in Washington D.C. They have enjoyed a lot visitiing this place and they have decided to visit a Native American Indian Community in a few days.

The National Museum of the American Indian is part of the Smithsonian Institution and is committed to advancing knowledge and understanding of the Native cultures of the Western Hemisphere—past, present, and future—through partnership with Native people and others. 

The museum works to support the continuance of culture, traditional values, and transitions in contemporary Native life. It has three facilities: the National Museum of the American Indian on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., which opened on September 21, 2004, on Fourth Street and Independence Avenue, Southwest; the George Gustav Heye Center, a permanent museum in New York City; and the Cultural Resources Center, a research and collections facility in Suitland, Maryland. 

More information: National Museum of the American Indian

The foundations for the present collections were first assembled in the former Museum of the American Indian in New York City, which was established in 1916, and which became part of the Smithsonian in 1990.

Traditional Navajo Jewelry

Following controversy over the discovery by Native American leaders that the Smithsonian Institution held more than 12,000–18,000 Indian remains, mostly in storage, United States Senator Daniel Inouye introduced in 1989 the National Museum of the American Indian Act.Passed as Public Law 101-185, it established the National Museum of the American Indian as a living memorial to Native Americans and their traditions. 

The Act also required that human remains, funerary objects, sacred objects, and objects of cultural patrimony be considered for repatriation to tribal communities, as well as objects acquired illegally. Since 1989 the Smithsonian has repatriated over 5,000 individual remains – about 1/3 of the total estimated human remains in its collection.

More information: History.com

On September 21, 2004, for the inauguration of the Museum, Senator Inouye addressed an audience of around 20,000 American Indians, Alaska Natives and Native Hawaiians, which was the largest gathering in Washington D.C. of indigenous people to its time.

Native Americans' families experience living surrounded, 

living in increasingly small reservations surrounded by the society 

that destroyed their civilization, and are still stigmatized. 

 For decades and decades, for hundreds of years except in Indian schools, they weren't allowed to speak their language. 

That stigma takes a terrible toll. 

 Joshua Oppenheimer

THE BEANS VISIT THE JEFFERSONIAN: TEMPUS FUGIT

Memories of Paqui Bean in the CRAM

This morning, The Beans have reviewed some English grammar. It has been a day to improve grammar and consolidate knowledge. 

They have talked about the Future Simple, Adverbs of Manner, Superlative and Comparative and Social English. 

They have also read a bit more about Christmas Carol of Charles Dickens. 

More information: Comparative & Superlative Adjectives

 

Taking care of the nature is a very important thing and the family has been talking about animals and their protection. Paqui Bean has talked about two important centres: the CRAM in El Prat de Llobregat and the CRARC in Masquefa. Both of them are near Barcelona, and  both of them work strongly to save animals. She has also talked about the Zeehondencentrum in Pieterburen.

Then, the family has listened carefully Ana Bean's speech about Maria Callas, her lovely friend. They have discovered a lot of secrets about her and her difficult and successful life and about the connection between Ana and Maria. It has been a very important moment for The Grandma who has appreciated a lot Ana's effort and work.

Óscar Bean and Temperance Brenan's Team

After talking about Asperger Syndrome, The Beans have visited Temperance Brennan and her scientific team in the Jeffersonian Institution and they have asked her some questions about the skeleton that was found by Óscar Bean in the Georgetown University Campus yesterday.

Dr Brennan has answered all the questions of the family and has been very interested in answering Anton Bean's questions about the Piltdown Man while The Grandma, fascinated by the laboratory and imitating Salvador Dalí, has lost her head and her idea of time and has started to live in a parallel universe until The Beans have waken her up.

More information: Live Science

This afternoon, the family has visited the Natural History Museum founded in 1846 as part of the Smithsonian Institution. It is a natural-history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. It has free admission and is open 364 days a year. 

Tempus Fugit for The Grandma

Opened in 1910, the museum on the National Mall was one of the first Smithsonian buildings constructed exclusively to hold the national collections and research facilities. 

The main building has an overall area of 140,000 m2 with 30,200 m2 of exhibition and houses over 1,000 employees. The museum's collections contain over 126 million specimens of plants, animals, fossils, minerals, rocks, meteorites, human remains, and human cultural artefacts. In 2016 it was the second most visited of all of the Smithsonian museums. It is also home to about 185 professional natural-history scientists, the largest group of scientists dedicated to the study of natural and cultural history in the world.

More information: Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History

The time is always right to do what is right. 

Martin Luther King, Jr.

MARIA CALLAS & ANA MARIA BEAN, CASTA DIVAS

Maria Callas & Ana Maria Bean leaving The Liceu

Maria Callas was a great influence for me and she also became my best friend. I always remember her with a smile, when I hear her voice.

Imagine:

In 1959, Maria Callas sings in Barcelona at the Gran Teatre del Liceu. I have a ticket for the recital to see her for the first time in my life. I am a huge fan.

Maria Callas is singing Madame Butterfly and I am enjoying the show a lot. During the break, I'm walking through the corridors and I hear her voice from the dressing room. She seems very angry. Her manager tells her that they need an actress because the extra is ill. She looks at me and points to me, she says: 

-Can you help me? I think you are perfect for the role. What's your name? - she says. 

-Ana Maria- I answer. She opens her eyes a lot and shouts: 

-Oh My God!! Just like me, lovely coincidence". 

And that same night I participate in my favourite opera.

It was a great success!!!

Later, that night, she invites me to a cocktail party in the Ritz Hotel. After then, we become very close friends.

An opera begins long before the curtain goes up and ends long after it has come down. It starts in my imagination, it becomes my life, and it stays part of my life long after I've left the opera house. 

Maria Callas

CREATING A PROFILE: THE BEHAVIOURAL ANALYSIS UNIT

The Grandma with the BAU members

This morning, The Beans have continued with their English classes. They have talked about the modal verb Have to/Don't have to and they have reviewed the Future Simple (Will). 

They have also visited Federal Bureau Investigation Headquarters to talk with the Behavioural Analysis Unit (BAU) members who work in Quantico, Virginia but have moved to Washington, D.C. to attend The Beans.

More information: Must vs. Have to

The family is a little worry because The Grandma has new strange friends and she's very happy with them although The Beans consider they're violent criminals. 

Edgar & Óscar Bean with Jason

Thanks to the BAU, The Beans have created some psychological profiles to demonstrate to The Grandma that she's wrong with her new strange friends.

Finally, the family has talked about the connections between the Gypsy communities and the Tarot during the Middle Age and how these incredible seers were able to predict the future and create the best spoilers that you could imagine.

This afternoon, The Beans have visited Georgetown University to enjoy with the last news in education and play some word games in its beautiful campus.

Download Crosswords by The Beans

Georgetown University is a private research university in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. Founded in 1789 as Georgetown College, the university has since grown to comprise nine undergraduate and graduate schools, among which are the School of Foreign Service, School of Business, Medical Center, and Law School. 

The Beans at Georgetown University Campus

Georgetown's main campus is located on a hill above the Potomac River. 

Georgetown offers degree programs in forty-eight disciplines, enrolling an average of 7,500 undergraduate and 10,000 post-graduate students from more than 130 countries. 

The campus is identifiable by its flagship Healy Hall, which is a National Historic Landmark.

Georgetown is the oldest Catholic and Jesuit-affiliated institution of higher education in the United States. The Jesuits have participated in the university's academic life, both as scholars and as administrators, since 1805; however, the university has always been governed independently of the church. At present, the majority of Georgetown students are not Catholic.

The Beans have enjoyed their visit until Óscar Bean has discovered a skeleton buried inside the campus. Who is s/he?

Download Medicine in English

It is far more difficult to murder a phantom than a reality. 

Virginia Woolf

THE BEANS FIGHT THE FUTURE: WE CAN DO IT!

Naomi Parker Fraley

This morning, The Beans have visited two old friends, Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, the two FBI Special Agents who are specialized in The X Files events of paranormal activity. Both of them work in Washington, D.C. and have invited The Beans to their office to talk about the mysterious sinking of their boat in Liberty Island. 

Mulder and Scully have exposed their different future theories and they have talked about certainly things (will) and uncertainly (may).

More information: Future Simple (Will)

After visiting them, the family has been talking about ghosts, legends, equality of genre and poetry and The Grandma has remembered an old legend from Majorca located in the Serra de Tramuntana and its influences in tv series, literature and cinema.

The family has created a good reputation to the worst and most terrible characters and they have been talking about kind experiences in a try to create a standard story for their future exam.

Finally, The Grandma has talked about the importance of creating connections between different things and she has remembered one of her heroes of her childhood: Charlie Rivel.

Legends are all to do with the past and nothing to do with the present. 

Lauren Bacall

This afternoon, The Beans have visited Foggy Bottoms, one of the most beautiful neighbourhoods in Washington, D.C.

Foggy Bottom is one of the oldest late 18th- and 19th-century neighborhoods in Washington, D.C. Foggy Bottom is west of the White House and downtown Washington, in the Northwest quadrant, bounded roughly by 17th Street to the east, Rock Creek Parkway to the west, Constitution Avenue to the south, and Pennsylvania Avenue to the north. 

The Beans are visiting Foggy Bottom

Much of Foggy Bottom is occupied by the main campus of the George Washington University. Foggy Bottom is thought to have received its name due to its riverside location, which made it susceptible to concentrations of fog and industrial smoke, an atmospheric quirk.

The Foggy Bottom area was the site of one of the earliest settlements in what is now the District of Columbia, when German settler Jacob Funk subdivided 0.53 km2 near the meeting place of the Potomac River and Rock Creek in 1763. The settlement officially was named Hamburgh, but colloquially was called Funkstown where a German community was founded by many German immigrants.

By the 19th century, Foggy Bottom became a community of white and black laborers employed at the nearby breweries, glass plants, and city gas works. These industrial facilities are also cited as a possible reason for the neighborhood's name, the "fog" being the smoke given off by the industries.

Finally, The Beans have stayed in the neighbourhood having dinner and playing some word games that Natalia Bean has offered to her family while they have been talking about heroes and superheroes.

Download Play Games with English 1 , & 3 by Natalia Bean

 R2D2's Message for The Beans (MP3)

WASHINGTON, DC: FIGHT AGAINST GHOSTS AND DEMONS

The Grandma saying goodbye to Yasmina

After leaving Yasmina with the Amish Community in Lancaster, The Beans have arrived to Washington, DC. They are astonished with Yasmina's decision but, of course, they respect it. She has written a beautiful goodbye's letter to her family explaining her real reasons to not continue the rest of the journey with them. 

Yasmina tells that living with the Amish Community will allow her to have the healthiest life, in the quietest place with the most peaceful people who create their own clothes and grow their own food. She has been living a frenetic life as an individual athlete and now she only wants peace, relax and a life under the rules of a community.

The Beans are in the capital of the USA and they have chosen the shore of the Potomac to rest and review their English classes. Today, they have talked about Superlative Adjectives and Neither/Both of them before visiting the Washington National Cathedral.

More information: Superlative Adjectives

Washington, DC is a city that has been witness of hundreds of historical past events, lights and shadows of the American history, a city that resume the worst ghosts and demons from the past, lives an intense present and draw the future of millions of people around the world.

The Beans arriving to the White House

It has been a day of incredible surprises because after Yasmina's story, the family has known the last news about the Federal shutdown that affects the most part of places and sights that they wanted to visit. 

They don't understand this decision that puts in danger thousands of employments and changes the normal life of the most part of the Federal institutions like museums, monuments or national parks. 

This is the main reason because they have visited the White House to try to talk with their inhabitants and try to arrive to a deal to avoid this uncomfortable situation. As you know, all things that happen in the White House are top secret and nobody has access to them but, in that case, some people assure that they have heard an old female voice asking aloud what the hell was happening there and reclaiming her rights to visit the most important and historical places. Other people assure that they had heard sentences like "Do you want to make America great again? Sure? Then, end with the shutdown, pay your workers and open the public buildings now".

Download Washington, DC Guide by The Grandma

Tomorrow, the family is visiting some old Grandma's friends, Fox Mulder and Dana Scully, because they need their help to try to solve the mystery of the sinking in Liberty Island, a real X-File. They're a little afraid because they are sure that a ghost rescued them. All of them heard the same song while they were swimming, Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah, but as you know, this is impossible because ghosts don't exist, do they?

The truth is out there…

Monsters are real, and ghosts are real too. 

They live inside us, and sometimes, they win.

Stephen King

THE BEANS: WITNESSES OF THE AMISH COMMUNITY

Raquel Lapp waiting The Beans arrival

Anton Bean is a great fan of History. He loves reading books and reports about culture, traditions and anthropology. He stores lots and lots of information in his tablet and he likes knowing new things every day and checking them with old ones. 

Anton is excited today because The Beans have decided to visit Rachel Lapp and her family, members of the Amish Community in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. It’s near Philadelphia and in the way to Washington, DC and it is a good chance to visit them and discover how their life-style closer to 19 century full of old traditions and an ancient religion afect the new Amish generations.

More information: New York Times

The Amish are a group of traditionalist Christian church fellowships with Swiss Anabaptist origins. They are closely related to, but distinct from, Mennonite churches. The Amish are known for simple living, plain dress, and reluctance to adopt many conveniences of modern technology. The history of the Amish church began with a schism in Switzerland within a group of Swiss and Alsatian Anabaptists in 1693 led by Jakob Ammann. Those who followed Ammann became known as Amish.

Rachel Lapp and John Book in 1985

In the early 18th century, many Amish and Mennonites immigrated to Pennsylvania for a variety of reasons. Today, the most traditional descendants of the Amish continue to speak Pennsylvania German, also known as Pennsylvania Dutch, although a dialect of Swiss German is used by Old Order Amish in the Adams County, Indiana area.

Amish church membership begins with baptism, usually between the ages of 16 and 25. It is a requirement for marriage within the Amish church. Once a person is baptized with the church, he or she may marry only within the faith. Church districts average between 20 and 40 families, and worship services are held every other Sunday in a member's home. The district is led by a bishop and several ministers and deacons. 

More information: Lancaster, Pennsylvania

The rules of the church, the Ordnung, must be observed by every member and cover most aspects of day-to-day living, including prohibitions or limitations on the use of power-line electricity, telephones, and automobiles, as well as regulations on clothing. 

Anton Bean travelling in an Amish transport

Most Amish do not buy commercial insurance or participate in Social Security. As present-day Anabaptists, Amish church members practice nonresistance and will not perform any type of military service. The Amish value rural life, manual labor and humility, all under the auspices of living what they interpret to be God's word.

Members who do not conform to these community expectations and who cannot be convinced to repent are excommunicated. In addition to excommunication, members may be shunned, a practice that limits social contacts to shame the wayward member into returning to the church. Almost 90 percent of Amish teenagers choose to be baptized and join the church. 

More information: Discover Lancaster

During an adolescent period of rumspringa or running around in some communities, nonconforming behavior that would result in the shunning of an adult who had made the permanent commitment of baptism, may meet with a degree of forbearance. Amish church groups seek to maintain a degree of separation from the non-Amish world. Non-Amish people are generally referred to as 'English'. 

The Beans entering in an Amish shop

There is generally a heavy emphasis on church and family relationships. They typically operate their own one-room schools and discontinue formal education after grade eight, at age 13/14. Until the children turn 16, they have vocational training under the tutelage of their parents, community, and the school teacher. Higher education is generally discouraged as it can lead to social segregation and the unraveling of the community.

Amish lifestyle is regulated by the Ordnung  or order, which differs slightly from community to community, and, within a community, from district to district. What is acceptable in one community may not be acceptable in another. 

More information: Exploring Amish Country

It is agreed upon within the community by the elders prior to the annual Communion. These include matters such as dress, permissible uses of technology, religious duties, and rules regarding interaction with outsiders. These elders are generally men.

The Beans arriving to an Amish farm

Bearing children, raising them, and socializing with neighbors and relatives are the greatest functions of the Amish family. Amish typically believe large families are a blessing from God. Community is central to the Amish way of life.

Working hard is considered godly, and some technological advancements have been considered undesirable because they reduce the need for hard work. Machines such as automatic floor cleaners in barns have historically been rejected as this provides young farmhands with too much free time.

Download Colours in Old Amish Quilts

The Beans are very interested in knowing how this community can work together building great structures without any kind of occupational hazards rules.

There can be no assumption that today's majority is 'right' and the Amish and others like them are 'wrong.' A way of life that is odd or even erratic but interferes with no rights or interests of others is not to be condemned because it is different.
 

Warren E. Burger