On a business trip to New York this week, I was able to steal a couple of hours for myself. I could have gone to a Gallery, or taken a walk in Central Park or something similarly uplifting. But I didn't.
The "Bell of Hope", St Paul's Chapel, corner Church and Vesey Streets.
Instead a I took a cab from my hotel on 56th street, and sped downtown along 5th avenue, past St Patrick's Cathedral, past the Rockerfeller plaza, the Public Library and the Empire State building before turning left on 34th and heading across Madison and Lexington avenues and onto the FDR, along the banks of the east river towards the Brooklyn Bridge.
(As an aside! My learned Chinese taxi driver told me that the city ran out of money building the bridge and couldn't pay the Chinese workers who built it, like so much of American infrastructure. So instead they were given land nearby - hey presto: China Town.)
It was 11yrs almost to the day since my first and only other visit to the big apple. I can't remember being more excited to arrive anywhere else. I all but exhausted myself tearing about Manhattan seeing as much as I could. I toured the UN on the east side and by contrast visited the US Intrepid on the west side. I went to Tiffany's listening to Frank Sinatra on my walkman and drank cocktails in a revolving bar above Time Square. I went to the roof of the Empire State Building and I took a ferry to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. I had a ball. Who wouldn't? There was one thing I didn't get time to do though.
So as we came off the FDR around the end of Broadway and headed towards Wall Street I thought of that visit, suddenly vivid in my mind. Of all the landmarks I saw on the journey, there was something missing now. To say it was significant in its absence is an understatement.
I was dropped on liberty street and walked to the Stage Door deli on Vesey street. The deli was full of construction workers. I bought a bacon cheese burger - one of the best I've ever had, and on which I chipped my tooth - which will remind me of this day as long as I have that tooth.
I crossed the road and visited St Paul's Chapel, apparently the oldest public building in continuous use on Manhattan. It was where George Washington went to pray after he was innaugurated as the first president of the United States. Outside the door is a bell (above) forged by the same place in England as the Liberty Bell and Big Ben. It has only been rung 11 times. once on March 11, 2004 and once on 7th July 2005, and nine other times on the anniversaries of the events that took place the other side of Church Street on 11th September 2001.
The bell is called "the Bell of Hope".
I did visit the World Trade Centre on that visit 11 years ago. It so completely dominated the skyline you could see it almost whenever you looked up and by the of the week I felt I had to go in, and up, it. I wanted to go to the "window on the world" restaurant but ran out of time in the queue and had to leave it for another trip. I was bound to visit new York again I thought, I could do it then. It was such a vast complex, and the gaping wound left by it's demise is shocking. The dignity with which New Yorkers carry this wound is quite humbling.
Nothing could have prepared me for how what I did next would affect me. Not even watching on TV the events that took place that day. I, like everyone, can remember vividly that experience, quite late at night in Australia. I was about to go bed early, I was launching a range of new laptops the next morning. Just as I was about to turn in, the TV announced they were about to screen "When We Were Kings", one of my favorite movies, and unable to resist, I sat back down. Within minutes though a ticker came across the screen: "a plane has crashed into the World Trade Centre in New York.". Before long, after the second plane had hit, the ABC scrapped the movie and went live to cover what was taking place. I sat up for the next four hours, jaw on chest in the shock and bewilderment. I've not yet got over that shock and bewilderment. Has anyone?
I crossed Church Street and turned right onto Liberty Street and went to the WTC Tribute centre. Just as I'm not going to go over the entrails of those attacks, I'm not going to attempt to describe the museum or the way it made me feel or the many poignant items on display there - among them an airplane window, a twisted iron girder and a pair of lady's shoes. I think it says enough just to repeat the words i wrote in the visitor's book before I went outside and fought back tears.
"Coming here is the saddest thing I've ever done. To those grieving loved ones lost that day, I am so, so sorry for your loss."
Footnote: Next door to the Stage Door Deli is a place called the 9/11 Memorial Preview Site (20 Vesey Street). I didn't have time to go in but just knowing about it was comforting. The memorial opens 11th September 2011. And with the Deli full of construction workers and Ground Zero itself busy with the sound of new buildings taking shape, the healing has certainly begun.
And one day, if not already, Osama Bin Laden will be dead.