Today is out of order, but it needs to be posted. No photos at the moment, they will come in when we are back in the regular course of events.
Today is cold, last night it rained and today the wind is picking up and it is a cold city. We are wrapped up on this 10 Degree Celsius day but it is still a bitter cold when coupled with the wind. There are still New Yorkers walking around in Tshirts though, so it mustn't be that cold!
Today one of the things we did was visit Ground Zero, the World Trade Centre Memorial site.
It was a very sobering experience, the ground is still under repair and construction and there is a lot of noise, a lot of police and security and a lot of people all around, however it was a very special place
The memorial is simply a park at the moment. The footprints of the Twin Towers have been turned into fountains 30ft deep, they are surrounded by the names of those who lost their lives in the attacks on 9/11 and the 1993 WTC bombing, nearly 3000 names in all.
The park is bare and barren at the moment, the grass has been covered with bark chips to protect it from the cold whilst it finds it roots, the trees have no leaves excepting one tree, the survivor tree. This tree was found in the aftermath of the attack, a bare 8ft tall stump. It was planted in a NY park and recovered, but it was ripped out of the ground during a heavy storm, it was replanted immediately on the WTC site and it bloomed that spring. It has remained on site ever since.
I cannot express the sense of grief and loss that still remains, this is a deep wound on the city's face, and one that will take a long time to heal at that. We looked up at the buildings that still surround the site and tried to imagine the terror that people must have felt watching this unfold literally 30 meters away from them across the road. We sat underneath the shadow of the new 1 WTC building and looked up at it's massive 1700 feet and tried to imagine it coming down.
It felt scary and sad.
There are questions on peoples faces in the memorial, but mostly there seems to be a lingering question of "Why?".
Why do humans do these things to each other?
But amongst the loss, there is a lot of positivity. St Pauls Chapel is an amazing site, the chapel stood without a scratch and became a lifeline for the men and women who recovered the site. Amazing, awful stories would have been told within it's walls, but a deep sense of friendship and pride remains there. There are smiling police posing with children outside, even the security guards who checked our bags prior to our entry were happy.
The recovery will be a long one, but from my brief time in this city I am sure that if there ever was a city that could recover, it is New York City.
It has been an exhausting day already.
I pray for the repose of the the souls of those who perished in the attack, and I pray for God to comfort the survivors and the families of those lost.
Take care of one another.
Love Matt and Tanya
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