UN-Adventure

This year Kristine and I got to chaperone Syracuse's international relations learning community United Nations trip.  Since we left at 6am and didn't get back until after midnight, Victoria got in a good day and a half of grandparent time.  When grandma dropped her off on saturday morning, to our chagrin, Victoria desperatedly did not want Grandma to leave. 

It was special going to New York again.  We were running around with tons of college freshman, but that didn't diminish the feeling.  It felt unexcpectedly familiar.  New York had always been where Kristine and I ran off to when dating.  Returning together after a while felt nice.   

What would NYC be without a long car or bus ride to get there.

Here we are at the UN.

After our UN tour and lunch we had some freetime. We went down to see the 911 memorial. This is the one of the new towers going up.  Like the previous World Trade towers, this new tower is the tallest building in NYC.  Its really amazing to see all the construction and "rebirth".  We have gone to the site several times after 9/11 and it was always just an open hole like a wound. Finally the space seems to be healing and coming back to life. 

This is the view from the North reflecting pool.  The museum is the building in the immidiate background.  Appropriately it looks like a fallen building.  Next two it is one of the new towers going up.

This is a picture of one of the relecting pools at night ( from the 9/11 memorial website.)  The memorial has two pools like this, one for each tower. The names of those who died are on the outside surrounding the pools.