Lorde surprised the audience at her concert at the Anthem Monday with some surprising news: She’d taken a dip in the Potomac before the show.
lorde admitting to swimming in the potomac at the dc concert pic.twitter.com/Cf8g2QK4Pj
— anna (◍•ᴗ•◍) (@whyets) August 30, 2022
“I was thinking today, I was lying in the Potomac river,” she said. “I love getting to swim in water where I’m playing. It makes me feel like I know you”—the rest of the sentence is obscured by what sounds like audience laughter and general confusion.
Lorde just told the crowd at the Anthem that she swam??? In the Potomac??? To get a feel for D.C???? The crowd is in SHAMBLES
— natalie escobar 🎷🐛 (@_NatalieEscobar) August 30, 2022
lorde just told a dc audience she swam and soaked in the potomac river today and the whole room booed her 😭
— austin (@jesuissupreme) August 30, 2022
Washingtonian: 5 Places You Can Swim in the Potomac This Weekend
— jason shevrin (@jasonshevrin) August 30, 2022
Lorde talking abt how she swam in the Potomac River today and now we must say goodbye to Lorde for she has a flesh eating disease
— Maria (@mrussinovich1) August 30, 2022
While many people in Washington are appalled by the prospect of any interaction with the Potomac beyond looking at it once in a while, there are people who’d like to see the 50-plus year ban on swimming in the river go away. As one advocate told Washingtonian this past spring, “It’s clean 350 days a year.”
New Zealand provides general travel advice for its citizens when they travel to the US on its SafeTravel website, a spokesperson for the country’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs & Trade tells Washingtonian in an email. However, the spokesperson says: “We do not provide travel advice about individual locations in the United States.”
This article has been updated with comment from the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs & Trade.
Andrew Beaujon joined Washingtonian in late 2014. He was previously with the Poynter Institute, TBD.com, and Washington City Paper. He lives in Del Ray.
