Last Sunday
So I have finally seen The Statue of Liberty, she is beautiful, but then I have always loved French girls. The words of Emma Lazarus have struck a chord with me for many years and I have always used them as a yardstick by which to gauge the current morality of U.S. immigration and foreign policy.

Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.

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Many of the buildings on Ellis Island have been allowed to deteriorate and are currently under restoration. The museum celebrating the immigration of bygone centuries is filled with exhibits of the large scale self-indulgent backslapping variety and although it is possible to spend several hours there, best to get in take a quick look about then step outside and admire the views of Manhattan.

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The site of the World Trade Centre is now a pit several stories deep, the concrete sides studded with the cut and rusted I-bars that supported the lower floors. the base is now covered by air conditioning units for the subway station below. Without access to a nearby building it may only be viewed through layers of galvanised steel fencing. If it were not for the street vendors dotted about it, selling cheap souvenirs you would hardly know you were standing at the site of such tragedy. Somehow I expected it to be accorded more reverence.

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It needs to be said that there is probably no better day to go site seeing in the U.S. that Superbowl day, so nothing was really that busy. Back in Costa Rica, it was election day and the busiest day of the year at the office.

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It may have just been coincidence but 50% of the bars in New York seem to be Irish places.

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Mental Note "I must remember to stay in a classier hotel next time"

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Stay tuned for the next exciting episode "Back in Canada"