In which DCist explores the city’s diplomatic portal to the world, highlighting the best events on the global calendar.
» November 17: It’s Student Youth Day in Turkmenistan! Student Youth Day is the day when all students reflect on the memory of Turkmenistan’s Dear Departed Turkmenbashi, Saparmurat Niyazov. It is a wonderful opportunity for the young students of Turkmenistan! The best way to celebrate Student Youth Day is to join with other young students to read and discuss the Ruhnama. No need to think about recent successors to Turkmenbashi such as the imprisoned Owezgeldi Atayew or the ineffectual but highly spellable Gurbanguly Berdimuhammedow on Student Youth Day! Plan a field trip—you never know when you will run into a great celebrity like Bill Clinton cutting a deal at the U.S.–Turkmenistan Business Council! Or you might visit the Textile Museum to learn about carpets made in the ancient Persian Khorasan province or in contemporary Turkmen culture. Ask for a Student Youth discount!
» November 18: On this day Haitians celebrate the 205th anniversary of the Battle of Vertières, the last battle of Haiti’s war of independence. The revolutionary forces of then Saint-Domingue dealt Napoleon a major setback in his first major loss as commander—a loss that virtually eliminated the French presence in the Americas. By restoring slavery in 1802, Napoleon set in motions plans to emerge as the dominant imperial force in the New World. Inadvertently, he also launched a small civil war in Saint-Domingue, where black and mulatto French officers such as Toussaint L’Ouverture and Jean-Jacques Dessalines joined insurgent fighters to repel French occupation forces. With war brewing with Great Britain, a naval invasion force bound for the Americas delayed by bad weather in Holland, and forces lost both to battle and defection, Napoleon made the controversial decision to give up his foothold in North America—hence, the Louisiana Purchase.
Napoleon’s thinking gets murky here. Did he believe that it would be a simple matter to retake Louisiana once he closed the fronts in Old Europe—an effort the Louisiana Purchase would finance? It mattered not a white to Dessalines, who whipped Rochambeau but-good at Vertières. We can all drink to that! Reportedly, Hyattsville hosts the Metro area’s only Haitian restaurant, Chez Yonyon. And the Haiti Institute of D.C. sells a thick cookbook, The Art and Soul of Haitian Cooking. New Orleans enthusiasts have plenty reason to tip their hats to the forces of Saint-Domingue, too—so for a celebratory dinner closer to home, see the good people at Bardia’s New Orleans Cafe. (Which is a massively underrated brunch spot.)
» November 19: Today is His Majesty Sultan Qaboos’s birthday! Ruler of Oman, he is the world’s seventh longest reigning monarch. He is the fourteenth descendant of the Abu Sa’id dynasty, a line dating back to the mid-18th century. And he has a Facebook profile!
Flags courtesy www.3DFlags.com.
Quite sadly a great many of his posts look like this:
That’s no way for a Sultan to socially network! And particularly not on His Majesty’s birthday! Note too that he has yet to declare an heir, and get your Poke-in figer ready. On November 19, write on HM Sultan Qaboos’s Wall. Send HM a little note—and celebrate Oman!
