September 11, 2011

[altwight]

9/11 was obviously conspiracy. and no one cares about anyone who died there that wasn't themselves. stupid day to remember. just forget it and get over it already.

[Lyn]

I'm a military brat. I went to school on base. It was 5th grade for me. My teacher stopped her lecture and turned on the tv. She didn't say anything to us, we just watched. I was the only one in my class who was crying. Everyone thought I knew someone there or something, but I just felt really sad. When I went home my parents were sitting outside in the back of our pick-up truck. My mom was crying. I didn't really know that 9/11 was going to change anything in my life - but it did. The next day when my mom came home from work, she said she was deploying to Turkey for 9 months. I was really young, so for her to be gone for so long and miss all the holidays hit me really hard. I will always remember the day she came home. My dad and I went to the airport to pick her up. I saw this woman from behind who kind of looked like my mom. I ran up to her screaming "mom!" and she turned around, bent down, and hugged me. For a split second I thought the person I was hugging wasn't my mom. She smelled different. Her hair was different. It was just sort of weird. Now that I think about it my parents acted weird the entire car ride home, but I was completely oblivious at that time. The next morning when I woke up, I remember my dad coming in, saying they were getting a divorce. I grew up hating the military for a really long time. I blamed it for my parents divorce.

[Vigilia]

I was in the last year of college (yeah another old fart here) but I got off early on that day (think it was tuesday?) so I was on my way to work at a shop at the nearby shopping centre. I was going to college in Dublin so it was afternoon this side of the pond. When I got there I first saw this huge crowd outside Currys (electronics shop) and every single TV was tuned to Sky News. The rest of the shopping centre was just empty, everyone was crowded at the shops with TVs. I saw one of the managers from the shop I worked at in the crowd and she looked upset and alone so I went to ask wtf was going on and as I got to her I finally got a good look at the TV screen and my brain went "well.. that's New York, wait, shit, that building's coming down??", there was a big collective gasp from the people there and at that point my manager just started bawling her eyes out and hugging me and I was even more wtf. We ended up closing shop shortly after that and I went home, everywhere was just dead quiet and everyone spent that evening glued to the TV. That's pretty much all I recall of the event... oh and luckily for my manager turned out her relative working at the towers was ok. Being in Dublin at that time was eerie just because practically everyone seemed to have relatives in NY and it was all people talked about.

[The Stig]

Learnt about it on the school coach on the way home (this was about 4pm, so 10am~ ish in US would've made sense), when the driver had the radio on constantly.

I went to ask why doesn't he switch it off and put some music on. I got scolded at as he said he got friends/family in New York. I didn't know exactly what the big deal was (hard to hear radio, noisy school coac h)

I wasn't aware of how significant it was until I turned on the TV when I arrived home. Then I wasn't hungry for the night.

Got into school the next day, although it wasn't as significant impact wise (not that many people talked about it) I clearly remember one of the guys in class remarking "Oh it's the stupid Americans' fault for building those 2 buildings so high"

[Apelila]

First off, damn this makes me feel old. Second, anyone who was <10 at the time who says they don't know what the big deal was and still is, you really don't know how this changed the US and it's really sort of impossible to explain. Especially to those who never lived in the country before that day. It helped amplify and set the stage for the current political fiasco's, and cemented us in the war's in Iraq and Afghan (though we didn't know it at the time). 11 year's ago America's fears extended ended at the shores of other continent's. It is staggering what we as a country have done and have allowed to happen in the name of fear; to have suggested many of the events prior to 9/11 would have been treated as overzealous fiction.

I was in my first semester of college, had moved from TX to AZ 1 month prior and was interviewing that morning at target. I remember my roomate's waking me up, telling me the basic facts - the world trade center and pentagon had been destroyed by airplanes (news couldn't report the exact damage yet). All govt faculties where evacuated, military was at defcon 2. No one knew where the president/vp where, if more attacks where coming. They said this all with a smile on their face while laughing. I thought that they where joking, that it was a movie on HBO (the channel that the cable box was on) and that they where fucking with me. I remember watching the world trade center collapse, then get hit by airplanes since I was watching a repeat out of order. I remember thinking 'wow, those effect are really good for a made for cable movie". Then i started changing the channel, and the same thing was on every channel. It wasn't until I got to Nickelodeon, with the watermark on the screen over the news footage that I realized what I was watching was very real. The WTC still kind of feels surreal to me - it still looks like watching a movie. I remember driving around Phoenix with my roomates and the city being deserted, we drove around what was completed of the 101 at the time and was the only car on the road.

And no matter what I'll always remember the sky. It was the same in AZ as in NY - a perfect clear blue, a hue of cerulean that only happens in fall. I used to see it as a sign that winter and colder temperatures where coming, now it makes me remember that month when so much changed.

[Ikith]

I was 14 and in like 9th maybe 10th grade.

I didn't quite understand any of it at the time, the thing I remember most about it is asking if I could stay home and getting told no (This was before school had even started/I had left for school). I don't remember much of it past that. I remember doing a lot of research when I first started college then I just kind of stopped researching it and noticed it was one of those things that changed the world.

[Deejay]

I was in middle school at the time. A friend and I always show up to class late because we were cool and didn't give a fuck. On our way to class, the first plan hit and we saw our principal watching a live feed in the front office. We ran to class and told our teacher what had happened and she yelled at us for "joking around" about such things.

Then the 2nd plane hit and and the principal came on over the loud speaker and announced a lock down until parents came to pick us all up. (I lived about 30 minutes NE of the city)

My father worked right down the street from the wold trade, but works from home on tuesdays, which just so happened to be the day the towers were hit. He dodged a serious bullet there.

[Tsakiki]

I was at work (IT group at a bank) in Toronto. The first word was from the internet, with the initial report being a small plane hit the WTC, before 9am. As the details emerged, it seemed more and more unreal. I spent the next few hours in my office, on the phone with my husband at home, who was watching CNN, and a coworker sitting with me on the phone with her husband, who was also watching TV. I kept hitting refresh on whatever news page I was using at the time. Hearing about people leaping from the towers, preferring that sort of death to being consumed by fire, just chilled me.

When the south tower collapsed, we were dumbfounded. At this point I called my sister in Seattle, waking her up. She didn't believe me when I told her what had happened.

The banks (and other companies) ended up sending everyone home before noon, partially out of fear that Toronto's financial district could also be a target.

I too remember how beautiful and clear it was that day, and the following days when there were no planes allowed to fly. It was very weird to look up and see no contrails.

I knew one person who was at a conference at Windows on the World, and another who was on American flight 11 (the one that hit the north tower), and I can't imagine the terror they must have gone through in the moments before their deaths.

That October, I met a group of people who's office had been working on the third floor of the WTC (software company we were working with). Hearing their stories, seeing the still-smoking pit that had been the WTC, and smelling the awful odors in lower Manhattan, really had an emotional impact on me.

I think some of you youngsters who see this as a non-event that for some reason bothered adults don't realize the impact this has had on the world, since perhaps you weren't aware enough of the world pre-9/11 to notice the changes. It wasn't so much the loss of life, since the total numbers pale in comparison to other events, but the use of passenger jets as flying bombs, the complete collapse of such huge buildings, and the coordinated attacks in different parts of the US just shook our sense of security to the core.

[pugnax179]

Was in 5th grade Music Class (not old) in the upper east side, when the entire school was moved to the church for an announcement. The parish pastor announced it to the entire school and I remember one girl in my class start crying her eyes out. Her father worked in the WTC, unfortunately, he did not make it out. The rest of the school day was cancelled as parents were picking up their child/children from school. I remember having to go to a friends place after being picked up since the MTA was suspended and I lived in one of the outer boroughs. The city had a burning smell for the next few days and my mom had a fear of going out due to not being white skin but being Indian.

[Lucavi]

First year in Community College, right outta high school. Big, bright world and all that. Sat down one sleepy morning in my English class to see the TV on and everyone looking scared and sad. Saw a clip on CNN of one of the planes hitting and thought it was some movie highlight, like they always do in those summer action flicks where the White House gets destroyed or something. Once it dawned on me that it wasn't some cheap movie, I remember a lot of nervousness. It was really just a sense of "what happens now? Where do we -literally- go from here? Is going home even safe?"

I remember hearing about the planes heading for the White House, and, since I live within 80 miles or so, I kept worrying about if there was some ground force or something, poised to attack. They let us out of class early and I got picked up, then remember calling my then-best friend to see if he was alright.

I just remember a lot of fear. Not the paranoid "Nigras are takin' over mah country!" fear, but an actual "holy shit, are we going to war?" kind of fear.

[Skyylya]

Was a freshmen in College here in florida. I had an early morning history class that I was in. Soon as the first plane hit they sent everyone back to their dorms as a precaution becuase of the alerts of other planes etc...

Got back in time to see the second plane hit on the news. I had seen on the news that the hijacked planes were out of boston and my mom was leaving from boston to pheonix that morning. It was a while before I got in touch with her obviously she was in the air flying but I was worried for a bit that hers might have been one of them. Unrelated but 2 days later is when papa decided to kill himself further burning that period of time into my brain. I had to fly from florida to connecticut 36 hours after 9/11. I think I took like 6 different flights hopping from one airport to the next and told over 9,000 people that my dad just died and I needed to find a way home until finally I found a flight into white plaines or new rochelle one of the two and my mom drove in and picked me up.

Was home for a few weeks and then decided it was best for me to go back to school since I was going through tryouts for the baseball team. 2nd day back at practice I blew out my shoulder and tore my rotator cuff, biceps tendon and the cartelage that holds the joint in place.

It was a shitty few weeks all around.

[Byrthnoth]

I remember the inflated casualty estimations (>10,000) and forget everything else about the ordeal.

[Serra]

Was a Freshman in Highschool and that it was a rainy day. I remember teachers talking about something happening during first period, but it wasn't until I got to my second period English class that I learned about it. Remember watching TV all day and not doing any work.

First off, damn this makes me feel old. Second, anyone who was <10 at the time who says they don't know what the big deal was and still is, you really don't know how this changed the US and it's really sort of impossible to explain. Especially to those who never lived in the country before that day. It helped amplify and set the stage for the current political fiasco's, and cemented us in the war's in Iraq and Afghan (though we didn't know it at the time). 11 year's ago America's fears extended ended at the shores of other continent's. It is staggering what we as a country have done and have allowed to happen in the name of fear; to have suggested many of the events prior to 9/11 would have been treated as overzealous fiction.

I'm currently in grad school and so a lot of the students I teach (especially the younger ones) have some shocking opinions of what is acceptable for the US to do in the name of security. It's definitely weird to see the divergence between people who grew up before 9-11 and those who were kids and grew up in a post 9-11 world..

[Elvis]

sophomore in HS, everyone here is so young! except ksandra.

[tyven]

sophomore in HS, everyone here is so young! except ksandra.

im surprised you werent on one of the planes

[tyven]

JK LOL YOU MY BRO

[Elvis]

That was kind of weak, tyven. I expect more nuance from you.

[Cleverness]

Was in high school at Brooklyn Tech, was 2nd or 3rd period, spanish class on the 7th floor. Could look out and see the towers, saw them covered in smoke and starting to collapse(hard to tell from that distance + all the smoke around it). Still doesn't really effect me to this day sadly.

[tyven]

gdi

[Acturus]

Second year of college. I had no morning classes that year (a result of lesson learned in my first year of college), and I woke up pretty easy in my apartment bedroom. I remember turning to AOL Instant Messanger to see a friend's away message say something to the effect of, "Someone flew a plane into the World Trade Center, wtf?" and I then turned on the TV. Since the default channel was one of the news channels, I watched the screen come into focus right as the second plane hit.

I remember feeling very, very small at that moment.

So much of the rest of that day was just perpetuated by confusion. Classes were cancelled. Cell phone towers weren't really working. I didn't know anyone in New York, but I still really wanted to call my parents in South Florida and check on them. No one was on campus, and at the time it was a 40,000-enrollee school in Central Florida. Just a deserted place with a few people like myself wandering around aimlessly trying to comprehend the significance of what was happening.

As news progressed in the days to come, as details came to light, that it was determined that it was an attack on US soil by a foreign entity, an entirely new wave of fear was presented to Orlando, "What if they hit Disney World?" I'm sure most major cities thought the same thing about their respective economic and cultural icons, but it was still fucking scary to just not know.

Of course, looking back on it, I'm more angry than anything at the constant news stream of "We don't know, but what if it's (blank)?!" The demand for news without having facts to back it up, and the general cloud of unknowns that everyone had about what was going on. It was at this time that I also realized that as horrible as planes into buildings was, the US was getting a taste of the reality that many developed and partially-developed nations see on a more regular basis. It was almost like it was some sort of horrible initiation into the rest of the world. That was an eye-opener for sure.