Check this out. The fronts of the buildings left intact and new buildings put up behind them. It looks like inside it is a windowless sad building but the fronts are nice. 

I share the following because several of you have expressed appreciation for hearing what is happening with USAID etc. 

There were special classes you could take, prestigious classes you were supposed to be very happy to be chosen to take, if you were a regular employee at USAID. Federal Executive Institute classes. I was picked a couple years ago to take one of the classes and it was good. 

Naturally, their contract was cancelled when all the contracts were cancelled. When we were all fired and traumatized, the people running the classes were also traumatized, because they loved teaching USAID staff and had been doing it for a decade. Once we were all fired they immediately made an offer to all of us to have a FREE workshop on developing new ideas for those of us interested in starting new businesses. The workshop was today. 

On my way to it I saw a former colleague on the train. This man is love and peace. I don’t mean he is peaceful and loving, I mean he is love and peace incarnate. He and his wife adopted five African siblings. He is the gentlest person I know. He was one of the people deemed “essential” and still working at USAID when the rest of us were locked out. 

One of the surprises, to me, of all of this is how nearly everyone complied with nearly everything and helped these people do this to us. 

The essential people all hoped that, at the end of the day, since they were essential, they would maintain employment. When it was clear USAID would be eradicated, they thought they’d be hired by State to continue the few surviving contracts. He had gotten a RIF notice in Feb when the rest of us did, even though none of the other essential people had. Then when they redid the RIF-ing they RIF-ed everyone, including the essential people. They all thought if they said, “yes sir” enough and did everything they were told and smiled while doing it that they would be spared. When they were all RIF-ed too it was devastating to them. 

We talked about how we were doing and I described transitioning a couple of weeks ago from bopping in my car to music while driving to suddenly crying while still driving. I said that I’ve been told, quietly, by other friends that they were bursting into tears randomly too. 

And I told him about the business I’m starting. I told him I’m registered in Maryland and have a tax id number. I gave him my new business card. I told him about the workshop. I told him about how the business came to be and that we’d already submitted a proposal and that, while I don’t think we’ll win, we were shortlisted. 

When he got off the train the woman sitting next to him took out her EarPod and said, “I didn’t mean to overhear.” Today was going to be her last day at work, she is officially RIF-ed tomorrow. She said what I said was the most inspirational thing she’d heard in a long time. 

When I got off the train another woman came up to me and said that she hadn’t meant to overhear but, she and her husband were appalled at what happened to USAID, her husband is a government employee, and he is also starting a business, and she wished me all the luck with mine, and asked for my phone number so she could text me. 

The workshop was lovely. Being with like-minded people was lovely. Being a bunch of do-gooders, most of them had “business” ideas that help people, but many of them also had no plans for how they would get funding. No one laughed at my company name. The questions my classmates asked were good ones to ponder and I left with a better idea of what our service offerings should not include. 

Before it began I thanked the nice people giving us this workshop and told them that if NOTHING else came from it, simply the fact that they were offering it was helpful, to us, and to everyone who loves and cares for us and feels helpless. 

Two hours after the conclusion I was at an event for the arts community of Maryland, Virginia, and DC. DOGE has cut the National Endowment for the Humanities and is coming after the National Endowment for the Arts. People are already losing grants. A man read his poem entitled, “We Are Still Here.” It feels like, when they are finished, no one will be employed. I know it is not true, plenty of people will have work deporting the rest of us. 

One of the women at the workshop had gotten 50,000 people in Nigeria Covid vaccines. Apparently everyone thought Power Africa would be safe and the Africa Bureau tried to save us. One of the women there said her son was surprised at how many people in the world USAID fed and she realized USAID has done a terrible job of communicating what it does. Of course, they weren’t allowed to communicate about what they do, that would be a waste of taxpayer dollars. My lesson from the past 12 months - it does not matter what an amazing job you do if no one knows about it. 

A Russian journalist named Ekaterina Barabash, 63, was arrested in February for spreading “false information” about the Russian military on social media. She was facing up to 10 years in jail due to outspoken criticism of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. She has escaped house arrest. 
“Fifty-nine decommissioned ambulances have been donated to Ukraine by the London Ambulance Service (LAS) since the start of the war in 2022, the service has said. 
The ambulances, which are helping to provide care for those in warzones or civilians injured, have been handed over to the charity British-Ukrainian Aid.” London is buying new, greener vehicles.