We thanked the girls and pressed on Park Avenue, where we found the purpose of the barricades we had noticed earlier. They were set up along the street, controlling the flow of traffic. Anyone who wanted to protest had to step, under the watchful eye of the NYPD, behind the barricades and into a cattle-pen like area. The barriers effectively controlled the public space, keeping the demonstrators crammed onto the sidewalks, able to see their compatriots on the opposite corner, but unable to join them unless they were willing to walk all the way down the block to cross the street. (The Village Voice reported what happened when people tried to cross some barriers, together with some pictures calculated for maximum shock effect.)

Being physically separated, however, didn't seem to dampen the enthusiasm of the groups of protestors, who, despite the freezing weather, waved their homemade signs and enthusiastically chanted slogans such as, "Hey, Ho, WEF has got to go!" and "Bush, Sharon, you can't hide! We charge you with genocide!" The anonymous police officer we had spoken to earlier was vindicated when someone took a microphone and, in a Tom-Morello-from Rage-Against-the-Machine-like voice shouted: "Hey, how many of us are from New York?"

A smattering of cheers.

"How many from out of town?"

Thunderous applause. Pandemonium.

"Uh-how many of us from NEW JERSEY?!"

Dead silence.

"New England?"

The crowd voiced a collective "Yeah!"

The first speaker finished, a woman identified as Stephanie from The Women's Fight Back Network from Simmons College in Boston took the microphone.

"People are not just losing jobs in Boston," she said. "It's happening in every city. . . it's caused by the same thing. . . I want to remind people that it would cost 17 billion to give health care to every child in America, but it costs 40 billion for this war. . ."

For a speaker from what seemed to be a feminist group to speak out against the war in Afghanistan fit with the theme of the event. The demonstrators carried signs espousing a whole rainbow coalition of left-wing causes, from environmentalists to socialists to what were apparently both members of that well-known resistance group Queers Against the Israeli Occupation of Palestine. (Interesting that they were interested in the cause of people who would stone them for violating Islamic law.) One fellow, who earned high scores from the cops and Beatrice and myself as well, even carried a "More Pay for NYPD" sign.

Searching through the mob, we finally found some New Yorkers, high school students from LaGuardia and Brooklyn Tech. Asked why they had come out today, one ventured: "The people should have a say in the decision making [instead of the corporate executives]." Another added, "All these people are warmongering and they support Bush in his self-important war."

Alan from Queens, who was handing out literature for the Socialist Alternative, gave his opinion of the WEF attendees: "I think they're a bunch of scumsuckers. They're pigs. [The WEF] is a strategic tool of international capitalism."

"Real" reporters, given free access to the proceedings by their press passes, were interviewing the more colorful demonstrators over the barriers. I saw one guy from Minnesota, his yellow raincoat decorated with political stickers, interviewed by a French TV crew. Like so many of the protestors we had spoken to ourselves, he gave a long, rambling speech about nothing in particular, about how bad globalization is. I felt bad for the French reporter trying to get quality material out of this crowd. He were looking for a José Bové, the dairy farmer whose crusade for quality farm products in the face of crappy, mass-produced convenience food made him a French national celebrity. He wanted someone to say something concrete, like "Yes, I am protesting these people because my uncle lost his job when his factory was moved to the Philippines, where they pay kids two cents an hour to do his job," or "I am protesting this Forum because my phone service works like shit, but we can't get anything done because our Congressman sucks the phone company's dick for his campaign money." Instead, he got some half-baked conspiracy theory about Israel, Enron, George W. Bush, and the Gnomes of Zurich. What was happening in that hotel down the block, in the minds of the crowds, was all the world's evils lumped together in one building-and they were going to root it out, consequences be damned.

Next: The Pause that Refreshes