what do bhutan, texas, and nasa have in common?

It's one of the coolest times of year in D.C.: The Folklife Festival! Every summer, for two weeks around the fourth of July, the Smithsonian sets up a bunch of tents on the mall and there's concerts, demonstrations, talks, and all sorts of awesomeness. Every year it's a country, a state, and something else; this year, it's Bhutan, Texas, and NASA. I went down Sunday (with S.Vix, until she gave up because I'm too slow and the weather was too hot).

Bhutan just sounds lovely. The education system is in English, so the people with educations speak perfect English. And were also chatty and friendly and wanted to talk about Bhutan. I always like watching craftspeople work at the festival. This guy is showing how he would hack up a piece of wood, although, yeah, he wouldn't be starting with a piece of treated lumber at home:


The national sport is archery and, wow, the target is really far away from where the archers stand. The guy in the foreground was explaining it to the audience - he's a journalist and speaks perfect English.

I wasn't the only one taking archery pictures:


I really liked the NASA stuff, too. I went to a talk about space food packaging and had a nice long chat with a guy who works on this - I get press releases about it every week but have no idea why I should care about it.