Upon returning from New York City and walking into a brutal heat wave in Toronto I was felled by a cold. Maybe I should have just stayed in Manhattan. Anyway, here are some observations about the City as it existed in the first days of August 2001:

• Manhattan is generally as clean as, or cleaner than Toronto’s once sparkling landscape
• The people there are far friendlier than those in Toronto (though maybe not as polite)
• The city seems always in a state of renewal, regeneration, or growth
• You haven’t experienced hell until you’ve descended to the bottom level of Times Square station at the end of a day where the temperatures sat around 36°C and then had to wait what seems like hours for a train, which — as it turned out — had no air-conditioning. (Despite that, I love the MetroCard.)