The City They Love to Hate

The Man Who Hates D.C. is in his late twenties. He was born in the Midwest, lived in Florida and attended college in Atlanta. He moved to Arlington four years ago, when his wife was accepted at graduate school here.

He remembers thinking: "I've been to Washington before. It's a big city. I'm sure it'll be fine."

But things were bad from the start. The moving company ripped him off. It took him months to find a job. Real estate costs were through the roof.

But what really bothered him was the me-first attitude he sensed all around him, the rudeness and the conceit. It wasn't just the people but the local governments, too, which were gripped in petty rivalries that interfered with everything from traffic planning to catching the sniper.

Plus, D.C. didn't have the stuff that big cities have: the energy, the friskiness. This was symbolized most recently during a trip The Man Who Hates D.C. took to Chicago. For breakfast he stumbled into a restaurant that served something called "frushi": fruit and rice made to look like sushi.

If there is a creative brain in Washington capable of inventing something as delightful as frushi, The Man Who Hates D.C. hasn't found it, and his anger and sadness are almost palpable.

"It all just sort of snowballed," said TMWHDC. "I thought, 'I have to stop just ranting to my friends about this.' " The final straw was the Iraq war, the most obvious manifestation of the loathsomeness that he thinks poisons Washington.

So in March 2003, he started his blog. Now some 800 people read it every day.

At about the time I was planning my lunch with The Man Who Hates D.C., I received an e-mail from a reader named Monika Jansen , aka The Woman Who Hates D.C.

"I moved here kicking and screaming from Boston nearly four years ago," Monika wrote. "My husband got a new job with his company, which forced us to relocate. I did not mind leaving behind the long, miserable winters of New England, but in the four years we've been here, I have been dreaming of the day we move."

Her gripes? The usual. Real estate prices. Traffic. Et cetera.

"All cities and metro areas have their problems, but the Washington area beats them all, as none of the above problems look like they are going to get better any time soon."