In the Depths of a Freezing Winter in NY

A New York with the look of pure crystal, splendid and sure of itself. A wonderful holiday spent with my sister, her graduation gift... although I've been back another 2 times, this trip to the Big Apple — not yet brutalised by bungled terror — was truly special. The photos are all scans from paper prints, so I apologise if some aren't quite perfect...

The journey really began downtown. Be careful when taking the metro to get there, because if you want to start right from the very tip you have to get off at the last stop, then the train goes underwater and continues to Staten Island... but the good thing is that station is tiny and in practice most of the train stops in the tunnel, so to get off you have to be in the first five carriages! They only tell you this once you're already on board, and since you can't move from one carriage to another from inside, you have to run between one stop and the next until you reach the head of the train! In a way... thinking about it now, it's funny!

Then once you get there it's truly incredible, because the downtown streets are very narrow and the buildings are very tall, so they're real canyons, and I won't even mention the wind at the intersections! From Wall Street we walked back up Broadway and at a certain point these two immense towers appeared on our left! To look at them all the way up gave you a stiff neck, and to photograph them you'd have wanted to lie down on the ground. Once up on top... you were on the roof of the world... the angels' point of view.

One single regret: having been stingy when it came to visiting the Statue of Liberty and not having taken the chance to go up it. I couldn't know that on later trips the post-9/11 alert level would no longer allow me to visit it...

Another wonderful thing on this trip, done on the suggestion of the friends who hosted us, was going to Harlem to see a real gospel mass. Not the much-advertised one at the Abyssinian Baptist Church, for which you have to queue for hours, but in a less-visited little church. The true sense of community: the mass lasts more than two hours, and people thank the Lord because they enjoyed themselves at the parish festival or because Mrs Jones brought a delicious cake, and then all the foreigners are greeted, they ask you where you're from, and every different nationality is welcomed with applause from everyone, and at the sign of peace... it's not just your neighbour offering you a soft, relaxed hand... everyone hugs and comes over to you and shakes your hand (and when I say everyone... I really mean EVERYONE!)

And then you go back out into the street, along the avenues that at every step bring to mind films, postcards and songs that have filled your whole life. Brooklyn Bridge and the Manhattan Bridge, dotted with white and blue at night. The reflection of the waters of the Hudson. The smoke rising thoughtfully from the manholes. From every district I remember a smell... rotting vegetables in Chinatown, coffee in the Village, luxury in SoHo, art in Chelsea, burnt hot dogs in Times Square, frozen snow in Central Park, sugar-coated nuts in Harlem and then again the people...

...the people who play chess in the parks, who collapse in the metro stations and wait lying on the ground for medical help to arrive (with no one touching them for fear of being sued for damages in case they cause an injury while trying to help), who say little prayers and leave notes on the mosaic dedicated to John Lennon, who run in shorts even when it's minus 6 degrees at midday, who go to work with tennis shoes under the business suit to change once in the office.

A different world, strange and absurd. Cheap and tacky in some ways, very elegant and posh in others, but one that sweeps you up and takes you and carries you along. Always.