Washington DC, the proud capital of the world's superpower, showcases the achievements of a nation. Washington DC ia a city that seeks to preserve memories in its myriad memorials and monuments, libraries and museums. DC is a grand city outlined harshly against the stark reality of suburbia where vast open spaces rub shoulders with crowded ghettoes, where the higher echelon of power politics and crime rub noses.

And all the while, the city throbs on… the sedate Capitol Hill, the historic areas of Georgetown, Dupont Circle with its artistic culture, the hip-hop of Adams-Morgan and the all-too-real ghettoes. If you arrive in Washington by train at Union Station, you are immediately confronted by the inescapable aura of power. The immensely impressive buildings are culled in Greco-Roman style. You instantly pick on the cues that the city's fathers had in mind when they envisioned DC as a city of splendid vistas. The grandeur of the wide avenues and posh residential areas belie the ever-prevalent poverty of the homeless. And if these images of Washington DC haunt you, there is the other side of the city, the learned, cultured side that inevitably triumphs and leaves you with memories of grandness.

For detailed country information see USA.