New York Hour

I was going to call this post New York Minute, but there is no denying it - this is going to be a very long post. Just skim over the boring bits.

On Friday evening I went for a tour of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which is a sprawling museum and I didn't bother to try and cover all of it but there was some cool stuff in there. It was one of those free walking tours given by volunteers through the hostel. The guide happened to be an off duty New York City police officer so he took us inside an NYPD precinct on the way to the museum.

After the museum I caught the Staten Island ferry there and back, largely becuase it was free and got a good view of the statue of Liberty. As the boat passed near Lady Liberty, I said 'stat you bro?' She didn't reply/was not amused/probably heard it before.

Yesterday I got up early and set out to walk Manhattan. Walking for most of the day I was able to pretty thoroughly explore: Battery Park, Lower Manhattan and the Financial District, the South Street marina, the Brooklyn Bridge and Greenwich Village. I still have a long way to go, and I have to get to the outer boroughs as well. 5 more days... Actually I did end up in the Bronx on Friday night, just rode the subway up there to see what it was like but didn't explore much.

Statue of Liberty, and the Ellis Island immigration station

Trinity Church on the intersection of Broadway and Wall Street, where emergency workers sought shelter as the World Trade Center towers collapsed.

The New York Stock Excahnge

Federal Hall, the first US Capitol and the site at which George Washington was inaugarated as the first president in 1789.

The Fraunces Tavern, where George Washington celebrated victory in the revolutionary war with his troops. I had a beer here, to share in tradition.


After the Financial District I was walking towards the South Street boat harbor and came across the New York Police Museum. It was a really good museum. The saddest and most extensive exhibit was on the 3rd floor, which was all about the September 11 attacks. Here are some of the items they recovered from ground zero:

And the guy at the museum showed me what my patch would be if I dispatched at the NYPD:

It was about this time that I recieved good information from a reliable source that the President was due to land at the downtown heliport.

The photo is not of his helicopter. I waited around for a while to try and get a photo of Marine One, but it was only about 2pm at that stage and my information suggested he was going to a broadway show so I thought it was a bit early yet. There were police and secret service everywhere, towing cars etc. If they were trying to keep it a secret, they weren't doing a very good job. I decided it wasn't worth hanging around too long, this would be my second presidential hooplah (the first being in 2005) and I was worried that the secret service might have a file on me! So I carried on with my day..

Another city, another famous bridge to walk across. This time I was tackling the Brooklyn Bridge. It offered some pretty good views all the way along but after all that walking my feet were so sore I opted to catch a subway back to Manhattan once i made it to Brooklyn in stead of walking back across.

Later last night, I ended up at Times Square again. I know, way to look like a tourist. But I love those lights, they are so amazing. Like the middle of the day in the middle of the night. I wanted to see them again. In the back of my mind, I knew the preisdent would likely be around there somewhere and sure enough before long I could hear the military helicopter circling above, and then came across roads blocked by sanitation trucks and a crowd lining temporary fences at the corner of Broadway and 44th Street. While there was a crowd gathering, at least 10 times as many people walked past oblivious to what was going on. A lady walking past asked me what was going on, I said "Obama's here", and her eyes lit up and she screamed at the top of her lungs "where!!!??? omigod where?!" And then the crowd got bigger. After standing around with the crowd for a while I began get tired, and my feet were still sore as. But I knew I wasn't going anywhere until I had seen him. I began to think like a secret service agent. I knew it was highly unlikely they would drive him out on to Broadway, with all those tens of thousands of people around. I knew I had to get to the other side of the theater. To do this I had to walk around the block due to all the police barricades.

Before long I was a block away at 6th Ave and 44th St. I was not the only one thinking that way. Although smaller than the crowd that had gathered on Broadway, a large number of people had gathered at barricades set up down the street from the intersection I beleived he would be coming out of. It was a one way street, and what these people had failed to notice was that most of the dozens of police cars, motorcycles, trucks, busses and ambulances were facing the wrong way, against the flow of traffic. So taking a huge gamble I secured myself a front row position against a barricade where there were only a few other people in sight. Within an hour, the sanitation trucks blocking the road moved, the motorcycles and other vehicles revved up, traffic was stopped, and the President drove past right in front of me waving out the window.

Today: Harlem here I come.