My International Week in DC!

So... this is a brief interruption in my Europe travel series... but interestingly enough, still involves Europe! As it turns out, this week has been filled with internationally-themed events starting with the French Expat Meetup on Tuesday:

Click here for more pictures!

Then it was on to the Waltz lesson practice for the Eigth Anniversary Gala and Masquerade Ball on Thursday:

The room for the ball is beautiful! (National Museum of Women in the Arts)

Look at all the details in the woodwork! (And the chandeliers were awesome)

Another item of note, is that half of what you see is made of faux-finishes

Dance lesson, after which my feet ended up hurting so much that I could still feel it when I went to the ball on Saturday! (Stone floors with simple loafers on are not a good combination for dance! Thankfully, I wore different shoes for the ball)

And back to France on Friday with a visit to French soil at the Embassy of France to hear a presentation on the financial crisis and investment strategies (Conférence: CRISE FINANCIÈRE: Vos finances au sein de la crise). My friend Ivan from the French meetup was one of the panelists, and it was quite enjoyable! Presentation was entirely in French and was organized by Union des Français de l'Etranger and Chambre de Commerce Franco-Américaine de Washington:

Seated panelists, from left to right:
YANN COATANLEM, CITIGROUP, Directeur, Think Tank Club Praxis
IVAN ZABALOIEFF, MS, Conseiller en Gestion de Patrimoine, AMERIPRISE FINANCIAL INC.

French Embassy consulate where the presentation was held

And Finally, yesterday (Saturday) I had the Eigth Anniversary Gala and Masquerade Ball at the Grand Ballroom of the National Museum of Women in the Arts:

Choreographed dance, it was really beautiful

Live waltz band on the right background of picture... chairs on left background for latin band that played second half of the evening.

Only picture of me from the evening, with new friend Q from the ball! 

The ball was great fun and I met lots of new and interesting people in the process. Also, I braved the dance floor a few times and didn't screw up as badly as I worried I was going to. lol. Now for more lessons and more practice!

I even took some panoramic shots of the event! Remember to use a real computer equipped with silverlight to view these, you'll have to click on them to start the viewing experience:

 

During the dance

After the dance was over