We started the morning with a wonderful breakfast at the hotel. Fruits, sausages, scrambled eggs, cereal, and assorted juices made for a great start to the day.
I also must say that there are more opportunities for the North and South students to co-mingle than I had thought it might. Now, I don't mean that students were frolicking hand-in-hand through the famous New York Daisy Fields. I mean that it was nice to see students from two schools who are inherently rivals kinda-sorta smiling in each other's general direction. I got to talk to some students from South, and it was a nice talk. Not even one weapon was brandished.
Then we went on to the 9/11 museum. That was an incredible experience. I won't try to go through all the details; that would take far too long. I will give you two main points I took away from the experience:
- I realized the actual gravity of 9/11.
Since I was very young when this happened, I had no idea what the Twin Towers were or represented. Now that I have a broader world view, things come into a sobering focus.
- I have a new perspective on the importance of life.
I always knew this, but the museum really helped me remember that, at least for me, human life cannot be priced. There was a picture of an injured man being carried out of the rubble left of the huge, magnificent Tower, and The only thing I cared about in the picture was
that man.
Here are some pictures from the locations where photography was allowed:
Next, we took a tour of Radio City Music Hall. That was amazing in a different way. Such an amazing place of entertainment,
And so full of history. The thing I found most amazing is that they had a hydraulic system built in the 1930's for the stage lifting system, and when engineers more recently remodeled and re-evaluated, they had no improvements for the system. This system, designed nearly nintey years ago, is still up to today's standard so. Holy wow.
Lastly, we saw the New York Philharmonic Orchestra perform, which was of course amazing. The guest violin soloist, Frank Peter Zimmermann, played his first piece, a measly fifty minutes. Hm.
He got a standing ovation, and graced us with and encore.
Goodnight.
