We started off the day by getting Katy a free Starbucks drink! Then we got on the train and went downtown to see the World Trade Center Memorial. The memorial was beautifully put together and consisted of two pools with waterfalls around all four edges and the names of the victims engraved around the outside of the walls of the pools. Around the area were trees that were taken from all the sites of the 9/11 attacks and replanted there, including a tree called the "survivor" which survived the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Centers after being destroyed down to a stump. The museum on site was still under construction, but it looked like a first rate building in progress. We took lots of pictures and then stopped for lunch at Subway before we headed to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. We have been to the Met multiple times, but the building is so large and the collections so elaborate that we still haven't laid eyes on everything inside. This time we started with one of the special exhibits on photography in the Civil War, which was fantastic! It was very interesting and Katy loved the photography aspects of it. I particularly liked one of the rooms that displayed the works of Dr. Reed Bontecou, a Civil War doctor who began to use photography to document soldier's injuries and recoveries. We also saw the South American, Islamic, and African arts sections for the first time. The masks in the African exhibits were very intricate decorative. In the South American collections, we saw lots of carved figurines, gold jewelry, and awesome watercraft. In the Islamic exhibits, there were tons of painted ceramic tiles with so much detail in them. The last new exhibit we saw was a special exhibit about the Punk culture and included lots of the clothing, music, and graffiti art that defined the era. Finally, we went back to look at some of the impressionist painters that are Katy's favorites and the Degas sculptures and paintings. When we left the museum, we went up to meet one of our friends at Annie and Company Yarn. We arrived a few minutes early and stopped at "The Corner Bookstore" on the next block. Here we found a few books for our friends children, including a new one called "Extra Yarn" that was really fun! Katy picked up some turquoise and orange yarn at the yarn store and we all headed back to our friend's apartment. For the evening, we had leftovers from the fridge and played a game that was new to us, called Frag, which is a first person shooter type game played on a board. Tomorrow we are looking forward to going to the Bronx Zoo!
