Getting ready to hit the subway
Our weekend in NYC started off with a bang! Right after we settled into our apartment we headed to meet Micah and then a quick jaunt to Jacob’s Pickles for a nice lunch before we started our fun tourist life. We grabbed the subway to head down to the site of the 9/11 Memorial. I was thrilled to ride the subway and had visions of seeing all kinds of great people on our trips since I had read Jackie Cangro’s book The Subway Chronicles: More Scenes from Life in New York. Much to my sadness I did not encounter the Chinese Curses Lady or Pickles the dachshund but I did see some pretty savvy young pole dancers (young males who had a great style of dance using the subway car poles to show off their skills–not the female stripper pole dancers although if we had been later in the night that might have been a possibility!), a Hispanic middle aged guitarist who sang the Frito Bandito song without the reference to Fritos, and an old Vietnam Vet who literally shoved a young dude out of this seat so he could have it. I tried to avoid eye contact as suggested but that didn’t work for me either. All in all–the subway rides were great and yes—there are a million stories.
Once we got to the site of the former twin towers we decided that we would just walk around all the construction zones and see what we could see. Tickets are required to go to the actual memorial site/museum area and since we really had not planned ahead to do this we did not get the full experience but when the museum is officially opened (right now it is just the “preview”) we will definitely make the trip to see it all. It is sobering and all I could do was try to envision how those images that I still have of that day fit into that landscape that I was seeing at that moment. Sobering to say the least. The following pictures are of One World Trade Center which is American’s tallest building at 1,176 feet. (Please excuse the dirty camera lens which I just now noticed as I posted these pictures!)
A small wall pays tribute to those who were a significant part of the rescue and recovery efforts—a small but significant statement of those brave men and women who fought through the danger to do rescues that I can not begin to imagine.
From there we decided to go to Wall Street to see the “bull” and the financial district. It was very crowded and hard to take pictures without a billion other people in them but we made it! Micah posed for me like the good son that he is.
Then it was on to the New York Stock Exchange to take a few shots of the beautiful building where all the action happens.
A few more random pictures of things we saw along the way to round out today’s post. What a great city. What great people. What a privilege it is to be able to explore our country and be a part of so much cultural diversity . It truly is a wonderful place.
