Remembering 9/11
It's been 4 years now.
When the most brazen terrorist attack in history occurred, the day that changed everything, I was teaching English in Japan. I came home, turned to the news on TV, and saw a burning building. That building looked vaguely familiar. It was probably some electrical fire, or some dumb executive trying to burn some documents and his pyre went out of control. I was sure that the firemen will able to put it out. It was then that the horror seeped in, when I heard the news anchor say, the weight of dread in his words, that a plane was crashed into the World Trade Center.
I was in total disbelief. I immediately called my most available colleague from the US, a buddy named Joe from Hawaii. I asked him if he was watching the news, and he said yes. He was equally shocked as I was. We had that conversation everyone has when something very bad has happened to something or someone mutually familiar.
And then the second plane crashed into the other tower.
HOLY SHIT!! I remember jamming into the receiver. It wasn't just the towers that were being demolished, it was also my perception that America was the invincible world power. If even America could be vulnerable to attack, is anywhere safe, or would peril ever follow humanity where they roam? I still managed to sleep that night, but I had to fall asleep with the events that I had witnessed scalding my mind.
Japan also felt the shockwaves of that terrorist attack. When I reported to the school office for work the next morning, the front of every newspaper bore that image, a besieged citadel of Western civilization.
For our parents' generation, the question was: "Where were you when Kennedy was shot?" For our generation, it would ever be: "Where were you on 9/11?"
I know you heartless bastards read my blog but never leave comments. But this time, please make an exception. I'm curious and I want to know.
Where were you on 9/11?
When the most brazen terrorist attack in history occurred, the day that changed everything, I was teaching English in Japan. I came home, turned to the news on TV, and saw a burning building. That building looked vaguely familiar. It was probably some electrical fire, or some dumb executive trying to burn some documents and his pyre went out of control. I was sure that the firemen will able to put it out. It was then that the horror seeped in, when I heard the news anchor say, the weight of dread in his words, that a plane was crashed into the World Trade Center.
I was in total disbelief. I immediately called my most available colleague from the US, a buddy named Joe from Hawaii. I asked him if he was watching the news, and he said yes. He was equally shocked as I was. We had that conversation everyone has when something very bad has happened to something or someone mutually familiar.
And then the second plane crashed into the other tower.
HOLY SHIT!! I remember jamming into the receiver. It wasn't just the towers that were being demolished, it was also my perception that America was the invincible world power. If even America could be vulnerable to attack, is anywhere safe, or would peril ever follow humanity where they roam? I still managed to sleep that night, but I had to fall asleep with the events that I had witnessed scalding my mind.
Japan also felt the shockwaves of that terrorist attack. When I reported to the school office for work the next morning, the front of every newspaper bore that image, a besieged citadel of Western civilization.
For our parents' generation, the question was: "Where were you when Kennedy was shot?" For our generation, it would ever be: "Where were you on 9/11?"
I know you heartless bastards read my blog but never leave comments. But this time, please make an exception. I'm curious and I want to know.
Where were you on 9/11?
Ground zero, visited two years later
posted by Cosmic Ocean at 2:33 PM
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