Lady Liberty and the Pursuit of World Peace...(and my son the diplomat)

Here we are at Liberty Island with Manhattan in the background. See the tallest black building? Now imagine that there is another building that same size on top of it and place 2 of those buildings just above my head somewhere. That is about where and how tall the World Trade Center buildings were. Here is Lady Liberty. Isn't she magnificent?? Her front and back are AMAZING!! The seven points on her crown represent the seven seas and seven continents. The tablet in her arms have the words July 4 1776 engraven on them. The statue is made of copper and looked like copper, but after so many years the copper turned green because copper when in open air oxidizes.
While the statue itself was a gift from France, the pedestal was commissioned and paid for with money raised in New York. By the time we got done with Lady Liberty and Ellis Island, The United Nations was closing it's gates. We were so disappointed. Here are my men in front of the flag posts and one of the buildings....the flags only fly when it is open.We decided last night to go back into the city for one last time before heading to Palmyra. We got up early, checked out of our hotel and headed into the city via train (again!!). We had a full tour of the United Nations. Our tour guide was from Spain. In our group were people from Jordan, Germany, Belgium, Switzerland and the US. Did you know that when at the UN you are no longer on US soil?? It is considered International Territory. We saw The General Assembly and one of the committees in session. The UN Security Council was in session and because of the nature of their talks we couldn't go in to watch them. This was absolutely the highlight of Jon's trip so far. He hadn't bought a single souvenir....not even from Yankee Stadium. No, my son buys ties and jackets and key chains with the UN symbol all over them. I even got in on the fun and bought him a few things.....
You see...Jon's been dreaming of being a UN Diplomat for several years now, but he told me yesterday, if he has to live in NYC then forget it!! We saw some diplomats being taken out in chauffer driven cars and I told him he would have it easy in New York......but he wasn't convinced. We'll see..............