Occupy Wall Street

Follow the live feed here: http://www.livestream.com/globalrevolution

Like almost everybody in the city I heard the buzz about the group of protesters in the financial district during the week. Today I had time to go investigate after spending the morning in Staten Island apartment hunting. First I walked down Wall Street which was covered with NYPD and K9 units but could not find any activity other than tourists taking pictures. I remembered that they were in a park and turned around, walked down Broadway and came across the camp.

I spent about an hour walking around talking to other people, listening to the grand standing. The camp consists of a haphazard mix of furniture, tarps, plastic bags of belongings and what I assume to be tents packed away for the day. The media has been quick to point out that the effort is without focus and apparently leaderless. This is however a grass roots campaign that has just begun to stumble and walk.

The movement's website features a video found on http://wearethe99percent.tumblr.com/. Watch it, It explains in pretty plain terms why the protesters are angry.

This woman was standing at the entrance to Liberty Park, greeter to the masses and face of the cause I guess.  Message is pretty clear and reminds me of Animal Farm by George Orwell. 

The grand standers are not allowed to use megaphones, which for a country as free as the States seems a bit rough. Instead using short sentences everybody within earshot repeats the message to those behind them and so forth. It is quite haphazard and fizzles out often but they are adamant and make it work.

I had to giggle at this, Only in New York.

Protesters making posters to hand to the crowd. I ran out of battery almost as soon as I arrived so I couldn't take photo's of any of the signs but will get some snaps tomorrow.

I left at about 4 o'clock and I heard that people had begun to gather at Brooklyn Bridge Planning to cross it and move into Brooklyn Bridge Park. 400 protesters were subsequently arrested. Here is a vid I found of the actual arrests on the bridge.

I've also heard Veteran Marines are on the way to the Liberty Park to help protect the protesters from any further police intervention. I think the events on Brooklyn Bridge incident will have caused quite a stir and expect this to be a much bigger story tomorrow, I am going back to see what is going on and will post updates.