HiJenx

We took a few proper days off at my friend Val’s. We didn’t venture further than the local Target the first day in Media and mostly did video editing and hung out with Val’s cats:

Chris and Chase

On the second day we had a look around downtown Media, a suburb of Philly. Media is America’s first fair trade town and seemed to be a clean and trendy area, full of people and life:

Infantry turned Trader Joe’s

The next day we finally went into Philadelphia proper and tried some cheese steaks. They were so big! We must keep our ‘split lunch’ rule in mind in the future. A minor warning if you try Campo’s; it’s cash only.

Philly was very warm and full of people since it was the third of July and the city was gearing up for its Independence Day celebrations. The Declaration of Independence was actually written and approved in Philadelphia, so this really seemed like the place to be at this time of year. It also meant many of the attractions were full up, so we decided to treat this as more of a trip one of two since going back in a few days later would not be a problem due to having longer term local accommodation (thanks again, Val!). We did get to speak to some interesting people though. We happened upon a Polish American Cultural Center. The woman there had lived in the Philly area all her life, but she still fully spoke Polish even being third generation because all of her education up until nursing school had been in Polish. It looks like their Polish community was still vibrant and thriving compared to many of the other similar communities we encountered in other states.

Old City, Philadelphia has a very red brick look, which was actually very nice:

It includes something called the Independence National Historical Park. I had had no idea that the whole thing is considered a national park, but having that kind of funding did mean it was beautifully well preserved. We had a walk around and looked at some of the things that had no queue. We will definitely be going back, possibly on the 6th of July, when things will have died down.

The park had many actors that would not break character in any serious way. We spoke to a man from East Anglia, who still had a strong regional accent though I think he’d been in the US a long time. It was hard to be sure, as he kept insisting he’d been there since just after the First Continental Congress met.  I suppose if Chris ever gets bored of IT, it’s good to know this odd sort of industry exists. 🙂
In the evening, we went out with Val and two of her good friends to a bring your own tequila Mexican restaurant. They would just sell you various mixes to make your own margaritas. The first margarita mix, the blood orange, was excellent. The second, in theory, was tamarind, but it mostly tasted like watered down tequila with sugar and was a strange shade of brown. I think next time we’ll just stick with the blood orange.

Check out the video: