Where Were You?

[Raiha]

[COLOR="DarkOrchid"][FONT="Times New Roman"]Where were you on September 11th, 2001? When did you hear the news? What did you feel?

I was in 8 a.m. sophomore English in high school, holding my girlfriend's hand while she choked on her tears. My teacher was crying because her uncle was in New York and she was sure he was dead. I felt empty and I didn't think about it until weeks later. Everyone walked around class that day in a state of shock, and some didn't know what it meant.

I didn't care until people began to politicize it, and to tell us that patriotism itself was bad, as well as pointing fingers. But now I think it's important to remember what happened to America when our guard was down. I'm not promoting war right now for a change, I'm promoting intelligent thought and an honoring of the dead.[/FONT][/COLOR]

[ChibiHorsewoman]

[color=#9933ff]I'm boring so after my story I'll tell you my friend Samma's story- she's from Brooklyn so she's much more interesting.

Okay so I was twenty and home from work because I had some kind of virus and needed to get checked out before I could go back the next day. So I was sitting in my front room waiting for my mom to come pick me up and I didn't have the TV on because I didn't want to get engrossed in something. My mom comes bursting through the front door and says: 'Meg, don't you have the TV on?" and I'm like 'No why would I?" and she says: Something bad happened So me being me I thought it was an earthquake in California. Boy was I surprised, the very first plane had hit the World Trade Centre

Anyways after that my mom and I drove downtown to my dr appointment and while we're driving there is no music on the stations just news and when we reach the exit for the hospital the second tower is hit. When my mom and I get inside the Dr's office everyone is talking about it and while I'm getting some blood work done the Pentagon is hit. Fun eh?

I was getting calls all day one from my friend Becky who was at MCC when it happened- she wanted to make sure I was okay since my ex husband was in Korea at the time and had only been there for two weeks. I got a call from him later to say he was fine- he was worried about me (which ya know is BS) and how he'd gone down in Full battle rattle when they'd made the announcement.

So the rest of the day we're wondering about my cousin Lynn who was living in Brooklyn and worked at a pre-school in Manhattan- later we found out she's fine, but the pre-school she worked at was two blocks from ground zero so she had to evacuate with a lot of toddlers. And we're watching the news and my mom won't even let me go up to the grocery store to get the special edition paper- I don't even know what my brother was thinking at the time. He was a junior in High School and is a lot more sensitive than I am. I also talked to one of my other cousins who was living outside of Boston- she said she'd actually gone to church which was very out of character for her.

But the part I remember the most is how quiet it was that night. I live near the interstate and about ten miles from the Rochester International Airport so it's a busy flight zone and you can hear cars at all hours of the night. That night it was so quiet because all flights were grounded and there were hardly any cars out on the road.

I guess I was frightened and worried for my ex (who at the time was my fiance :animeswea) at first. The next morning I woke up and before I went to work I went into my brother's room and just stared at this poster he had called Facades of New York because there was a picture of the Twin Towers on it. But then when I went into work the next day my supervisor freaked me out by asking me every twenty minutes if I was okay. So by lunch (I used to work from 6:30-2:30 in a cafeteria) my nerves were getting frayed. I think I snapped at her. And on my drive home from work I heard End of the Innocence by Don Henley and had to pull over because I was crying too hard.

For a while it was nice because there was all this patriotism and pride in the country. But then about two weeks after the attack my friend Amanda and I were driving through one of the parks here and we saw some rednecks (yes we have those here in Western New York) with a large plywood sign on their pickup (way to live up to the Cliche) that said 'Death To the Towel Heads' in large red letters. And that just pissed me off. I was sickened to think that people would go off on another group of people just because it was said that a group of Muslim EXTREMISTS had gone off the deep end. My friend and I yelled at them and drove off and kept on talking about how ignorant some people are- I mean don't they realize Muslim's died in the attacks too?

So I think that about sums up my feelings: Fear, pride, annoyance and outrage.

It's interesting that you came up with this topic. I was talking to my friend down in Brooklyn today- she was in 4th grade when the attacks happened and her school had to be evacuated because of the smoke- she went home with a friend since she didn't know whether her mom was alive or dead and didn't find out until 9:30 that night after she'd come home from walking over the Brooklyn bridge. After that the schools in Brooklyn were closed for a week because of all the smoke and the fact that a lot of kids there had lost someone. Even after the attacks my friend was saying that she had to go out with a surgical mask over her face- even when she went to visit family in Queens.[/color]

[SaiyanPrincessX]

[SIZE="1"]My first year of high school, and what an opener that was. XD

I was in ninth grade, and in second period I believe. We have tvs all throughout our school, even in certain hallways, so it was televised the whole day. I remember watching it in math class the whole period and seeing the second plane hit, and then see them both collapse. I was so nervous too.

My mom actually picked my brother and I up from school early because she tought we might be scared, and let us stay home the next day. There were some students just walking out of school.[/SIZE]

[chibi-master]

I was in first grade. We all walked in and the room was darkened. So we just sat in our desks. When everyone was sitting, our teacher said,

"Kids, something very bad happened this morning."

And she turned on the T.V. in the room. I remember seeing the planes crashing into the towers and blowing them up. She told us that a lot of people died while we were still sleeping. Sweet lady, huh? I just stared at the screen. Everyone started to cry except me. I was just staring at the T.V. in shock. I thought it was some really odd dream that I would wake up from. It didn't seem real at all. I can't even remember the rest of that day. Just that morning.

[Lunar]

[COLOR="Indigo"]Ah, how I remember the day so vivdly. i was at school in mathI knew something was wrong the whole day. my mom was at work and she felt something, too. it's amazing how humans can feel something bad's gonna happen before it happens.[/COLOR]

[ChibiHorsewoman]

[quote name='chibi-master'] I thought it was some really odd dream that I would wake up from. It didn't seem real at all.[/QUOTE]

[color=#9933ff]I know what you mean. Watching the coverage from Washington DC and New York City with the black smoke and that bright blue sky it just didn't seem real to me either. I just can't believe a first grade teacher thought that was a good idea to show her students[/color]

[Drizzt Do'urden]

I'll never forget,it's one of things that inspired me to join the military. No I didn't jump into infantry, I wanted to do my part but lesson my chances at getting shot.

I was a junior in Chem II, as soon as the first tower toppled and our teacher got the news she flipped CNN on and we started watching the coverage. Bless her heart she opened her classroom all day to any students who wanted to keep up with it. Needless to say it hit me hard the number of people that would/could be killed so I sat there all day with a group of my friends and of course the group of people who just wanted to skip their other class'.

[Allamorph]

[FONT=Arial]I was in science class in the seventh grade, chewing out the morons who thought the explosions were funny. Looking back, a lot of my confusion and uncomprehension got channeled into fury during that time.

Our cool janitor had had a small heart attack not a week and a half before that, too.[/FONT]

[SunfallE]

[COLOR="RoyalBlue"][FONT="Lucida Sans Unicode"]I was on vacation from work at the time. I was at my father's place, playing Diablo II on the computer when he came and told me that someone had flown a plane into the tower. I thought he was kidding. He was not. I don't have any friends or relatives out there, at least not at the time of the attack, but I remember feeling very surprised over it. [/FONT][/COLOR]

[chibi-master]

[quote name='ChibiHorsewoman'][color=#9933ff]I know what you mean. Watching the coverage from Washington DC and New York City with the black smoke and that bright blue sky it just didn't seem real to me either. I just can't believe a first grade teacher thought that was a good idea to show her students[/color][/QUOTE]

Yeah, at first I thought it was a really scary movie. And then I started to realize it wasn't.

And I agree. But we would have found out eventually. Although I believe that saying "A bunch of people died while you were still sleeping." was a poor choice of words. Or a poor choice of anything to say at all.

[Gelgoog Pilot]

High school, homeroom, most of the day was canceled after that. Thought it was a little lame, since unlike most at that particular school I would have rather learned something and not be consumed by the event.


Well look at it this way Chibi-master, you were in first grade, how wouldn't you expect a sugar coated politically correct explanation?

Not to appear as some evil angry man but, it had that feeling of inevitability to it. I suppose it is a cynical or realists' view but, what did we expect? Really?

We were in everyone's affairs, and not just politically but militarily. You mess with enough hornet's nests eventually you'll get stung, it's just a shame innocent people had to pay for the mistakes of our leaders.

[Raiha]

[quote name='Gelgoog Pilot']
We were in everyone's affairs, and not just politically but militarily. You mess with enough hornet's nests eventually you'll get stung, it's just a shame innocent people had to pay for the mistakes of our leaders.[/QUOTE]

[COLOR="DarkOrchid"][FONT="Times New Roman"]Danger Will Robinson.

This thread wasn't designed for a 'well we had it coming' standpoint. Please do not turn this into a place to talk about that.[/FONT][/COLOR]

[ChibiHorsewoman]

[quote name='Raiha'][COLOR="DarkOrchid"][FONT="Times New Roman"]Danger Will Robinson.

This thread wasn't designed for a 'well we had it coming' standpoint. Please do not turn this into a place to talk about that.[/FONT][/COLOR][/QUOTE]

[color=#9933ff]Well you did ask what people were thinking didn't you? Not trying to start with anyone nor do I agree with what Gelgoog Pilot is saying- I'm just playing devil's advocate here.

I don't think it's fair to say that we had it coming, but it is fair to say that we've been trying to play the world's police for too long and someone got fed up with it. It's just a shame that so many people had to lose their lives so needlessly.[/color]

[Korey]

[FONT="Franklin Gothic Medium"]I'll play devil's prosecutor here and just point out what people have said and bring up the original post.

[quote name='"Raiha"']Where were you on September 11th, 2001? When did you hear the news? What did you feel?[/quote]

Now I'm pressing this because I didn't see a need for people to say it was inevitable for us to be attacked. This was my expression when that was said.

[IMG]http://icanhascheezburger.files.wordpress.com/2007/03/whut-ian.jpg[/IMG]

How can you say that innocent people that had nothing to do with our government's workings and "world police" status in the world deserved to die? These weren't soldiers, politicians, figureheads. These were INNOCENT CIVILIANS. Unarmed, innocent people trying to make a living and were targeted by terrorist cells. How can you say that we deserved that? That statement just bleeds of ignorance. Who cares if people got fed up with it? The fact is that innocent people died. My neighbor didn't do anything to offend our fellow humans in the middle east. Neither did I. Neither did you. So let's stop the "we had it coming talk" with no real reason to justify it. It's ignorant and is almost a blatant slap in the face to Americans who didn't deserve to die because of actions our government takes.

Moving on...

I was in my 7th grade Humanities class when the news broke to me. We watched it on the TV and I was just in awe of what happened. I couldn't ascertain it all that moment. I didn't know who attacked us, and why it happened. I thought it was a mere accident at first, but that was cleared up for me real quick. It is truly a shame that these people had to die so needlessly. I'm glad that no one in my family was hurt and my heart goes out to those who lost loved ones in those areas.[/FONT]

[Rachmaninoff]

[quote name='ChibiHorsewoman'][color=#9933ff]Well you did ask what people were thinking didn't you? Not trying to start with anyone nor do I agree with what Gelgoog Pilot is saying- I'm just playing devil's advocate here.

I don't think it's fair to say that we had it coming, but it is fair to say that we've been trying to play the world's police for too long and someone got fed up with it. It's just a shame that so many people had to lose their lives so needlessly.[/color][/QUOTE]Yes she did, on the day it happened, their initial reaction to the event itself, not what they thought once the shock was over. If someone's reaction was to think that, then they would have done well to notice the last part in the opening post about honoring the dead. Taking pot shots saying we had it coming isn't the way to honor anyone.

Anyway, if anyone wants to get into the politics behind that, and I'm looking at everyone, start another thread on it and leave that out of this one please.

As for myself... I was visiting friends in California at the time. I remember 9/11 for the simple reason I was suppose to fly home from Southern California to Utah on the 12th and naturally my flight along with everyone else's was grounded until a little while later. I remember feeling really surprised. Not that such things happen, but it was the first time something like this had affected my life in any manner.

I finally got home once flights were allowed again, and fortunately I have no relatives or friends living in that part of the US. I still feel bad for those who did lose loved ones to the tragedy. It's something I know I'll never forget either.

[DeLarge]

[SIZE=1]Myself and most of my friends at school heard nothing about the attacks until after school. I was in my first year of secondary school, barely two weeks in, and it was just a normal day. None of the teachers listened to the radio or watched TV while in school, so I'd assume none of them heard about it either.

I got home and logged on to the internet, and there on the MSN homepage was the picture of the towers surrounded by smoke and flame, slowly collapsing. I couldn't quite comprehend what was happening - nothing like this had ever really happened in my lifetime (that I was aware of, anyway), and it really shocked me that something like that could happen to the most powerful country in the world.

I was home alone at the time as well - my brother was still at school, my parents were both at work, so there was no-one older who could rationalise the whole thing for me. I freaked out, basically.

My mum was the first to arrive home, and she hadn't heard either. I rushed to the front door and dragged her to the TV to show her the images. She cried.

The following day at school we had our first lesson cancelled, and were taken into the hall to have an assembly about the attacks, where the teachers basically explained to us what had happened. The rest of the day just carried on like normal.

To be honest, 9/11 didn't affect us as much as the London bombings on 7/7 did. On 7/7 we had to stay in school, but all our lessons were cancelled as we all tried to get in contact with friends and family who had been in London at the time. My dad had been in London that day, but he had returned home before the attacks were carried out - he still counts it as one of the luckiest days of his life.
[/SIZE]

[Darren]

I was in my 6th grade home room class. English, I think with my teacher, Mrs. Pena...

I believe we were covering prepositional phrases when the principal knocked on the door. She called my teacher out of the class, and I remember the collective "Oooooh, you're in trouble" that the class made every time you got called to the office either through a knock on the door or through the intercom. It was no different for the teacher. (Even though it was a joke)

She was out there for quite a while, and we were all beginning to get rowdy. One troublemaker, Zeke, pulled the wire out of his notebook and heated it up through friction on the back of his chair... Then he proceeded to burn people. I knew something was up when people were running around trying to tattle on Zeke and Mrs. Pena didn't come back into the class. I could still see her outside, talking to the principal. Her back was turned...

When she finally walked back in, we all sat down real quick, as if to pretend that we weren't just running rampant through the class. She paid no attention and walked very quickly to the back of the classroom and stared out the window. I thought she was mad at the class, but it wasn't until the girl sitting behind me, Amanda, said aloud that she was crying. A bunch of students started asking her what was wrong, and finally she turned to us and said that a bomb went off in the WTC...

Yeah, it was a big deal, but at the time, I didn't really know what the World Trade Center was... I found out that it was in New York and that it wasn't a bomb as soon as the 2nd plane hit... Most of the kids didn't really care. They were all running around saying "Did you hear?" It was just gossip that little kids didn't really understand. Some parents came and picked up their kids, but I had to stay for the whole day. Luckily, none of my teachers made us do work, and at that age, not doing work far surpassed the terrorist attack.

Anyway, I found out later that my brother got to watch it live as the 2nd plane hit, as he was in a tech. ed. class with TVs... And when I saw the footage at home and all over the place for the following months, I thought "Wow. This is bad." Anyway, the night of the incident, my parents dragged me along to a church, where we watched Bush give his famous speech reassuring the country and whatnot. (We didn't even know what was in store for us at the time...) And then, the pastor of the church, asked us to pray for the families, the victims, the firefighters, and the police. Each time it was about 10 minutes, so we were there for quite awhile.

Perhaps the part that impacted me the most was when I made the connection that my mom was supposed to be in the tower that very day... I knew she was supposed to go on a business trip to NYC, but it had been delayed. Several months later, (When she had actually gotten back from her newly updated business trip) I checked out her original itinerary and saw that she actually had it written down to eat breakfast in that restaurant (I forgot the name, what tower, and what floor, but it was pretty high up and pretty famous from what I understand) on the morning of September 11th...

That freaked me out completely and from that point on, I didn't remember 9/11 as the day America experienced the biggest terrorist attack in history. I remembered it as the day my mom dodged a bullet because I knew she would have been killed. So really, even though it may sound selfish, that's all I'm able to associate with 9/11 because I was so young at the time... I really had no feelings about what was going on in the country.

[ChibiHorsewoman]

[quote name='Rachmaninoff']Yes she did, on the day it happened, their initial reaction to the event itself, not what they thought once the shock was over. If someone's reaction was to think that, then they would have done well to notice the last part in the opening post about honoring the dead. Taking pot shots saying we had it coming isn't the way to honor anyone.[/QUOTE]


[color=#9933ff]I've no problem with honouring the dead and I don't believe that anyone should have died or that we deserved this. No one deserves to get burned to death or have to jump out of a burning building because the death upon impact is more instantanious than incineration.

It was a sick terrible thing that took many lives needlessly. Friends of my family lost their nephew because of the attacks my aunt and uncle though they'd lost their daughter and for twelve to thirteen hours my friend thought she'd lost her mom. Many people were impacted by those events in more ways than one and for much longer than 9/11/01- did you know that in all five burroughs the schools were closed for more than a week because of all the dust and debris in the air? My friend from Brooklyn told me that because of her asthma her mom made her wear a surgical mask for months whenever she went outside.

9/11 is definately a day I will never forget to remember to honor the dead and be thankful to be alive.

PS On the one year anniversary of the attacks my ex husband and I along with millions of others gave the terrorists the collective finger and got on an airplane to go somewhere (in my case Texas) The planes and the airports were crammed.[/color]

[Nomurah!]

[SIZE="1"][COLOR="HotPink"]Don't remember what grade I was in, but I know I was relatively young. The day went by like normal. Nothing. At all. The day ended. I got off the bus at the high school, walked into my mom's room. She told me what had happened, but I didn't really grasp it in my mind. I didn't understand, at all.

I remember the next few weeks very clearly however. Seeing the news broadcasts. Seeing the planes hit over and over. Hearing that Spiderman the movie would hold production on the news (this at the time, was a big deal for me.). Still, I never understood why anyone would do stuff like this.

I never will.[/COLOR][/SIZE]

[Desbreko]

[color=#4B0082]Posts deleted, temp ban lifted, [b]problem solved[/b]. Mods, you have a delete button for a reason; please use it. There is no point in arguing over why a post was off-topic.

Likewise, members, stay on topic please.[/color]

[DeathKnight]

[quote name='Desbreko'][color=#4B0082]Likewise, members, stay on topic please.[/color][/QUOTE]

[color=crimson];)

My mom woke me up on the morning of 9/11 and simply told me to turn on CNN. She ran off without telling me why or what, so I groggily stood, turned on the t.v. in my room and there was Tower 1 alight like a candle amidst the New York skyline.

I spent most of the day with the rest of the country in sensationalist orgasm, watching the replays over and over and over again. The next few weeks played out with the world loving the United States, patriotic fervor overwhelming us, and a promise to go get those guys.

I also remember one image sticking with me the most out of all the other horrifying ones. It wasn't people covered in the dust of the towers or the towers themselves coming down, it was the walls and walls of missing person pictures strewn endlessly everywhere.

Then in the years after the tragedy was used to build more tragedy. I remember that and live that even now. [/color]

[ChibiHorsewoman]

[quote name='DeathKnight'][color=crimson]
I also remember one image sticking with me the most out of all the other horrifying ones. It wasn't people covered in the dust of the towers or the towers themselves coming down, it was the walls and walls of missing person pictures strewn endlessly everywhere.
[/color][/QUOTE]

[color=#9933ff]If someone thinks this is off topic- I'm sorry.

But it's interesting that you mention all the pictures of the missing that were posted. George Eastman House had a huge exhibit a few months after the attacks which included a lot of the pictures taken during the attacks. Some were shrunk down and put into some kind of mosaic to represent the WTC and the Pentagon.

I'd also like to point out that there are memorials all over the place for 9/11- back in 2003 I was in Las Vegas with my family and there was a large memorial and a timeline in front of the New York New York. It was pretty moving- and quite noticeable- I don't know if they still have it though.

Also I would like to add that back in May I went to visit a friend of mine in Albany and we ended up at the Museum of New York History in Albany. Right now-and I don't know how long it's been there or will be there- they also have an exhibit for the World Trade Center and 9/11. They have all sorts of things from a public telephone that was melted from the blast to scattered papers from Ground Zero- a license plate from a vehicle that was there and even a steel girder from one of the towers. This of course is along with a lot of pictures and kind of a time line. It's really something else to be able to look at objects recovered from the scene- it gives you a whole different perspective on the whole thing- although not as major as if you were there or even in one of the five burroughs on the day.[/color]