Occupy Wall Street

 

I went down to Zuccotti Park in early October.  The protest was still in its relatively infancy.  The weather was warm and the feeling of the park was relatively festive.  

Downtown Wall Street is in relative walking distance from where I live.  Close enough that on a whim on a nice day I was able to go and see what's going on, far enough that I never heard one drum beat when I was asleep.  

In comparison to other city parks, Zuccotti Park is more of a large public plaza.  There are no facilities nor is their much grass.  Close by are both Battery Park and Battery Park City, where there are lots of grass and trees and restrooms.  

However, after reading a profile piece in the New Yorker on Kalle Lasn (http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/11/28/111128fa_fact_schwartz), the choice of Zuccotti Park was more strategic as a gathering place than as a place to start an occupy movement.  

When I visited, the park had just gained national attention.  News vans, swat teams crowded the perimeter.  Protestors had begun a long term encampment.  Plus, the 9/11 memorial had recently opened up, a block away.  At times, the park seemed to be as crowded with tourists as protestors.  

The actual protest felt like a music festival that was still going on, weeks after the bands left, strong smells of urine, body odor, incense, cigarettes and dope.  However, signs of a working society were apparent, a library, a kitchen, a health center, the drum circle on the South end and the protest-speech area on the North end.  People of all walks of life were there participating in different forms, whether in conversation, observation, or debate.  Suits, hippies, flower girls, blue collar union guys with their hard hats, trannies, punks, educated hipsters, older retirees, all showed up and were trying to say something.  

I walked the grounds, took photos of who I could and of what I saw.  I read the signs and listened to the protest.  After a couple of hours I walked over to Wall Street, barricaded with parade gates.  The plaza in front of the exchange was cordoned off and guarded by mounted police.  The tourists herded and funneled past, watched intently by cops.  I managed to peel off on Broad and then walked up through canyons of skyscrapers and eventually back home.