Eleven years ago, on another Tuesday, the morning was beautiful. As I looked out the window, the sky was a clear blue, the sun was shining and there was a hint of Autumn in the cool air. I was doing my usual morning routine: listening to the traffic and weather report on the radio, as I got ready to work.
As I looked out the window I thought, it might be a nice day to go out. Then, from the traffic helicopter the pilot is saying that there's smoke coming from one of the towers at the World Trade Center. This caught my attention, what?! it can't be! -- At first, the traffic-helicopter pilot said that maybe a small plane might have accidentally crashed into the tower. At that I immediately turned on the television, this is impossible! I thought, there are a million safeguards against this happening. As I watch the smoke coming out of one tower, I start calling everyone I know, telling them to turn on the television.
One of the people I called is one of my cousins, who worked as the superintendent of a building in Queens, from whose rooftop you could see, across the river, the two towers. As he is on his cell phone talking to me, watching one tower burn, from the roof of his building in Queen, and I'm watching the live report on television, we both watch live as the second plane comes, accelerating in speed, and slams into the second tower. Now my cousin is a tough man, and he told me that he felt as if somebody punched him in his heart and tears just ran down his face, when he saw this.
His thought was: why? we are a nation where people come here from all over the world, because of the promise of a better life -- why this horrible action? Because it dawned on both of us and the rest of my friends and relatives, as we frantically tried to communicate with one another, that this was a terrorist attack.
Fate was kind to us in that we did not lose close friends or relatives, but that did not diminish the pain we felt. To know that neighbors who had gone to work, were not coming back, that people who were just trying to make a living, were made targets because of hate. It was a hard thought to contemplate. We spent that day trying to find out where this or that family member or friend was.
One of my friends, who worked on the 88th floor of one the towers, got saved because of a toothache. Monday evening he called his dentist, who had an office five blocks from the World Trade Center, about this toothache, and the dentist gave him a 7:30 AM appointment, for Tuesday, September 11, 2001. He went to the appointment, worrying about getting to the office late. Only to come out and seeing one of the towers spewing thick black smoke, and people looking up at the sky as the sound of another jet was fast approaching and then feeling the impact of the second jet hitting the other tower. And people realizing that this was serious, and him just thinking -- about his fellow workers who were already there.
One of my cousins was on the last subway that went under the World Trade Center, on its way to New Jersey, before the towers collapsed. And then the countless friends that just ran for their life as the shock wave of dust, smoke and debris covered everything in lower Manhattan, like a volcano eruption.
I remember going there with my camera, the following week, on September 18, 2001, to record in photos, the destruction. The whole place was coated in a gray, sticky, ash -- honestly, you would have thought that a volcano had erupted and this was volcanic ash. But is was more gruesome, when you went to the site of what had been two majestic, and imposing towers, all you saw was this huge pile of still burning and smoking ruins. It broke my heart, for you see, I too had once worked there. Just that August, I had shown one of my visiting relatives the pride of New York.
The saddest part of all this, is how the politicians appropriated this tragedy for their own gains. Most of us here in New York wanted the twin towers to be rebuilt exactly the way they were. But, oh no...the politicians of all stripes and parties made it their agenda -- to use this to push their agendas, without much regards for the feelings of the families and friends of the victims. To me, it is shameful that the promised museum honoring those that died on that horrible day, is still not fully open to the public.
At least this year, politics is being kept to a minimum, the ceremonies are being kept simple, with politicians excluded. Hopefully, sooner rather than later, a fitting tribute and museum will finally be open, and the memory of all those innocents whose lives were so brutally cut short, will be honored in a respectful and joyful memorial. So that the world will not forget who they were, and remind us that we are all brothers and sisters. That no matter from what part of the planet we come from, what our background is: we are all human beings and should have respect for each other.
