The Resilience of New York City

What’s there to say about New York City? Everything and nothing, really. The city speaks for itself, rising triumphantly out of the ground and into the sky. However, while its landmarks — the Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building, the Brooklyn Bridge — tell part of the story, it’s the whispers, yelling, stomping, rushing, laughter, and tears of eight million individual souls across five sweeping boroughs that tell the other. Not to mention the eight million who came before and the eight million before them.

This year, 2020, New York had a new word attached to its story: epicenter. One day in March, people took the subway to work and then took it home — not realizing that it would be the last time for a very long while. While desks gathered dust in Midtown towers, ambulances whirled and buzzed across the city. The world watched in shock and awe as a Navy hospital ship cruised down the Hudson, and rooftops and windows became a 7 p.m. social club of sorts, where previously unknown neighbors smiled and waved each night from a distance while clanging pots and pans for frontline workers.

Eventually, the sirens began to fade, the Navy ship returned to sea, and New York City opened its heavy, heavy eyes again. The fallout of the situation is real: we’ve lost our favorite restaurants, stores that always had just the right thing, and the curtains remain closed on Broadway. Nevertheless, New York City is a resilient one, home to resilient people.

New York City is not dead — and it will never be dead. At iBestTravel, we say New York City forever! Here, our love letter to the City That Never Sleeps is expressed in the resilience of its people and the beauty of its culture.

“The invincible spirit of New Yorkers will always make a city rise.”

— Renita E, guest-favorite host at Empire State Building

As long as we keep growing as a global society, NYC will never die because people are always willing to come to live in or visit the greatest city in the world. If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.

— Monique Fletcher, MTA New York City Transit Bus Operator/Brooklyn

“As a native New Yorker, I have experienced so many challenges that this city has faced and have seen our community rise up to meet every one of them. The people of New York are the most resilient and determined, with an innate ability to bounce back. Within my East Midtown community, we support one another and work together to build back our businesses.”

— Anelle Miller, Executive Director of the Society of Illustrators and the Museum of American Illustration