Back in June, after photographing Polly & Shahan’s wedding we moved over from New Jersey to New York City to finish our our trip.  Chris had never been to New York City before and while we could easily hop a bus from our hotel in Rutherford, I thought Chris should really enjoy the city from STAYING in the city.  It’s entirely different when you are staying there versus driving in and out.  So I booked us a hotel (the Waldorf Astoria, which sadly was a HUGE let down) and we finished out the last few days of our New York trip in style.  We didn’t have a lot of free time but the first priority on both of our lists was seeing the 9/11 Memorial which had been openend the previous September.

In order to visit the memorial, you have to get tickets online weeks in advance, I got lucky that someone tipped me off to this – otherwise I’d have assumed you could just show up.  You arrive at your designated time and go through a long, long line winding around the outside of the memorial and eventually through a building where you go through security much like one does at the airport.  Then it’s another line before you get released into the memorial.  We walked in a few steps and it was like sorrow hit you like a ton of bricks.  The entire memorial is sobering.  There are two massive water features, each in the foot of the former twin towers, with names of the lost engraved onto the sides.  There are trees and the promise of green space around but at the time there was still a lot of orange fence and construction taking place.  We began our walk around the memorial quietly as it felt wrong somehow to talk in such a place.  I took a few pictures, not a lot but enough to capture the memory of the place for myself.

The odd thing about the memorial was how many people were treating it like Disney World.  People were laughing, giggling and jumping around.  They were taking pictures of themselves making faces and goofing around with friends.  People stopped me quite a lot to ask me to take a picture of them in front of the Freedom Tower or the fountains with everyone they were traveling with (the big camera generally is a beacon to those saying I can probably handle your point and shoot).  Generally I have no issues taking pictures for people of them together in a space but for me it just felt somewhat wrong to be cheesing for a camera in such a place.  Maybe it’s just me though.

Another odd thing was that there were so many children there asking their parents about the attacks and what happened.  There was an older boy who wanted clarification about how the planes hit and so forth and it hit me that even though this boy was around 10 years old, he wasn’t alive when this happened and most of the kids there under 13 or so wouldn’t remember it.  It’s weird to think that it was so long ago, yet seems so recent.

Below are my pictures from our trip, last year I shared what my story was from 9/11 but I thought this year would be the perfect time to share the memorial and how we are moving forward.

The Freedom Tower as seen from the base of the fountain.

One thing that was overwhelming here was the scent of the chlorine in the water.  I am sure they will eventually balance this out but it is quite strong!

Here you can see how much work is still going on.

The metal is designed to stay cool no matter what temperature.

Another view of the Freedom Tower, which will eventually be the tallest building in the United States.

To the left is the Freedom Tower, reflected in the eventual museum to be on site on the right.  There is a mini museum and store you walk through prior to exiting but eventually it will be held in this building.  Sadly I heard that there are arguments over who will pay for it so the construction has came to a halt.

The Survivor Tree.  This tree was found barely alive beneath the rubble of the WTC.  It was relocated and begun to show new growth so when the plans for the memorial park, they wanted to include this tree.

Finally, this may be my favorite image that I took there, funnily enough it was with my iPhone.  It is an image of the Freedom Tower as seen through the Survivor Tree.  I call it Freedom through Survival.  🙂