Degree of Freedom

2006年9月12日星期二

sunset at city

Simple dinner

Iron chef

ready to go

Longest Island

We went to Long Island the past weekend, to be more precise, to East Hampton. The distance from upper westside to East Hampton is about 208 miles and I was astonished to find how long the Long Island was. The friday night trip was smooth and we luckly found the house in the woods easily. Instead of a beach house in my imagination, this is a quiet house in woods, as most second home of Americans: comfortable and clean. My friend commented on this, this is too neat to be a home. We spent the day on Main Beach, dined in town and then drove to Light House near end of the Hampton. For a 24 hours trip, we saw a lot. The next day, we set out for UN. Because it was the day before the 5th anniversary of 9/11, there were tons of police men on the street. The UN, as usual, was not a very exciting place to go but a necessary one. Then we went down to Empire State Building and spent a better hour there. On the top of the building, Mom tried to imagine where the Twin Towers used to look like. I indulged myself into the world of King Kong. Both stories are about the clash of two worlds: one within human race, one between human race and other being. At the end of the day, what really matters? 9/11 is past and the pain is still there. My time in town is so called post-9/11 period. Are we living in a better world now? One interview with a firefighter then has a wonderful comment of the event. The firefighter said, 9/11 will be remembered not because of its pain, but for the humanities we see throughout the event.