| Date & Weather | 6/14/02 (Fri), Rain | Check Out | - |
| Milage & Route | - | Check In | - |
| Motel | Best Western | ||
| New York It is difficult to decide what to write about New York not only because this city has a lot of things to mention about but also it gave me some first experience in the U.S. such as taking subway and using umbrella. However, I'd like to focus on two historical sites there related to the American Revolution because visiting D.C. and Philadelphia strongly  interested me in it. The first one is the Federal Hall Memorial where George Washington took his oath as the first American president. The Hall faces Wall Street and there is the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) across the Hall. The Hall and the NYSE were heavily guarded today. Although I thought I wanted to participate in the tour of NYSE, I had to give up doing so. After that, I went ahead Battery Park to ride on the ferry to Staten Island. My purpose was not to go to Staten Island but to see the Statue of Liberty from  the ferry. There were two reasons why I did so. The first reason is clear;
it was free. The second reason is the ferry was used in the introduction
of a movie "Working Girl," which is my favorite. Anyway, I'm
going back to the history of the Statue of Liberty. It was presented by
France in 1886 to honor the friendship between the two nations and the
100th anniversary of America's Independence. As to the Statue of Liberty,
I have a memory of a Japanese popular TV program whose name was "American
Transcontinental Quiz" in my childhood. The goal of the quiz was "New
York." In this program the first question in Tokyo was always  about the Statue of Liberty. One of what I remembered was "What does
the statue hold in its left hand?" Now I can easily answer it because
of the last 12 days trip. Finally have to also refer to WTC, "Ground Zero." I think if people have chance to go there they should go because they can understand the tragedy was not like show on TV but really happened. World Cup Japan could move on the final round. I think it is precious opportunity for Japanese because almost all Japanese can be proud of being Japanese. Although Japanese share  longer history than American, there are few things all Japanese can be
proud of in history as American strongly do so for the Independence of
America because Japanese have periodically changed their authority and
culture by themselves. For example, the power has changed between Emperor
and Shogun. In addition, while George Washington is the person almost all
Americans take pride in, Ieyasu Tokugawa, the first Shogun of Tokugawa
Government, is famous for not only the best strategist but also a big liar.
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