New York is a fascinating city and I have been there many times over the years. In September 2000, I had no idea, of course, that I was photographing the Twin Towers as they were for the last time.
I had been visiting with my buddies for a weekend to celebrate the upcoming wedding of a dear friend. One of the friends lived in Jersey City and wanted us to come down. We did not have a lot of time to see all the sights we had hoped to and did not get to visit the Twin Towers. We discussed returning the next September to do just that and to possibly make it an annual trip.
I did make the trip back there the following year, but under much different and solemn circumstances.
On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, I watched along with the world as the towers were brought down by terrorists on live television.
My thoughts went immediately to our friend, Andy, who not only lived nearby in Jersey, but also worked in one of the shorter buildings in the World Trade Center complex.
My repeated phone calls to him and my friends that day were met with busy signals and no service. It was a nerve-wracking day, waiting to hear of his fate.
By nightfall, I learned that he was OK and had been evacuated away from the scene before the towers fell.
The world changed forever that day, as we all know.
Fast forward a few months later to Dec. 1, 2001 and I found myself on a Greyhound bus along with my wife, Silvia, and other Canadians heading to Manhattan for a 'Canada Loves New York' weekend to show support for the wounded city that we loved.
New York suffered an economic meltdown due to the tourism crash that happened after the attack. Prices for things like fancy $1,000-a-night hotel rooms next to Central Park were now just $80. The city was starving for visitors and a few thousand Canadians answered the call.
Tourism glee soon dissipated, however, as we arrived at Ground Zero to pay our respects to the fallen. New York is a loud city, but the silence of the crowds that gathered along the barriers to keep people away was profound.
The chain-link fences were adorned with messages of love and hope from people from around the world that wanted to say something, anything, to a community that was hurting.
The smells and sights of the wreckage were so stark compared to the work-day buzz of the surrounding city. The scale of the devastation was nearly impossible to grasp.
Fires still burned inside the pile and the smoky haze was acrid and grim.
Work crews, with their cranes and heavy equipment, were dwarfed by the sheer size of the task ahead of them. Tractor-trailer loads of rubble and twisted steel left the site one after another piled high with debris and merged with the regular commuter traffic and yellow taxis and headed off to dumpsites. They were literally moving a mountain.
By nightfall on Saturday, many of our fellow Canadians gathered at the Roseland Ballroom to pay tribute to the city at a rally featuring then-Prime Minister Jean Chretien and his wife, Aline. There was an outpouring of grief and love for the emergency responders who risked their lives that September day and to the many who gave their lives.
"It is a symbol of endless courage and that is, my friends, why Canada loves New York," the prime minister said.
Blue Rodeo, Jane Siberry, and Cirque du Soleil performed. The love and friendship of Canada for its brotherly country was on full display.
The experiences of the day were sobering, to say the least, and not soon forgotten.
Just a few years ago my wife and I once again visited Ground Zero site where the carnage of the Twin Towers has since been displaced by beautiful memorials and love for the lost.
The profound silence of the crowds that we witnessed in 2001 remain, however.
Even 20 years on, the wounds of the great city are still sore.
