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Women find positive reasons to visit DC despite government shutdown

Some women found the National Museum of Women in the Arts even more special during the government shutdown because of the records women are setting in Congress this year.
Credit: wusa

The Smithsonian saw nearly 10-million fewer visitors in 2018 than in the previous two years, and 2019 is getting off to a rough start due the government shutdown.

People came from across the country and traveled from all over the world to be in the nation’s capital during the first weekend of the new year.

“We were expecting to visit a few monuments around here, but now we’ve been told we can’t actually go to some of them because of the shutdown,” Tholoana Matli, who is visiting from South Africa, said.

The closures left tourists searching for something free to do in Downtown D.C.

“The moment I got here I started googling what else is opening during the shutdown,” Alice Zsu explained.

“Despite the shutdown, let’s see what’s open and what we can do,” Lesha Barry, who traveled from Massachusetts, said.

A bunch of people ended up at the National Museum of Women in the Arts.

The line was wrapped around the building because admission is free on the first Sunday of every month.

“I asked her if she liked women in arts and pictures. She was like yes. Let’s see that,” Barry said about her friend, Naoko Kadowaki, who was visiting from Japan.

Some women found the museum even more special during the government shutdown because of the records women are setting in Congress this year.

The 116th Congress is the most racially diverse in congressional history and has the most women elected to the House.

“The equality is really necessary and all spaces – not just in politics, also in education, and engineering, and all of that,” Matli explained.

Many female tourists were proud of the direction women were taking in politics despite traveling to Washington in the middle of a government shutdown.

“Even walking here, I was like isn’t it great to be female, and we’re on our own in a city, and we don’t need a guy, and then we’re going to the women’s museum,” Barry said. “So, rah rah!”

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