Danny Glover and the Lincoln Memorial

I started today out at the Lincoln Memorial. I had a free morning and I’d thought I’d better do a bit of sight-seeing. I was taken there by an Eritrean cab driver who thanked me personally for Fred Hollows and the cornea transplant organisation he set up in Eritrea. I think he thought I’d organised the whole thing.

I was really excited about visiting the Lincoln Memorial. It’s one of those sights that you feel as though you already know because you’ve seen it in so many movies. The scene is always the same – big Abe sitting in his chair, telepathically mentoring someone who’s going through a personally crisis. Mr Smith in Mr Smith Goes to Washington. Gump in Forest Gump. The marionette Gary Johnston in Team America.

It was the scene from Team America that was going through my head as I stood before Abe. In particular, the song from the scene, Freedom Isn’t Free, and the line about it having a ‘hefty f**kin fee.’ I think I may have inadvertently sung it out loud because teachers started ushering their school groups away from me.

In front of the memorial there are a collection of shacks manned by war veterans. They sit in little booths surrounded by the badges of various regiments and urge passerbys to support the troops in Iraq. I asked the guy in the most colourful booth if I could take a photo and he shook his head and told me that even Danny Glover charges for photographs. I must have looked confused because he said it again. Even Danny Glover charges for photographs.

It wasn’t until the fourth time that he told me that even Danny Glover charges for photographs that it dawned on me. The guy in the booth was the spitting image of Danny Glover! He saw that realisation dawn on my face with alarm and started blustering that I should go and take a photo of Abraham Lincoln instead. ‘He’s much more interesting!’ he insisted.

I had to disagree. A guy who looks exactly like Danny Glover sitting in a War Vets shack was the most interesting thing I’d seen on my travels so far.

Unfortunately the guy was as big as Danny Glover and threatened to break my arm if I took a photo. You’re just going to have to take my word for it!