9/11 From My Perspective~ By Bekahroo

While I was talking with one of my best friends the other night via chat, the subject of 9/11 came up. That conversation has inspired this post.

He described it as “a day of hell for all of us.”

So what was it like for me, an eight year old, living overseas when 9/11 happened? I’ll try and explain it to you as best I can.

It started with a late phone call from our teammates, telling Mom and Dad to hurry over to their apartment as fast as they could get there. Something terrible, and world changing had happened, but we weren’t told what it was at that time. The next day, we four kids were told to go to our friends’ house instead of getting in a taxi and going to school like we usually did. We walked across town to play. But our play was strained for reasons untold. The adults were strangely quiet and worried. Oh well, my eight year old mind wondered something like “they must be tired.” I went back to playing. We had internet only for e-mailing, very limited phone service (and none that was untapped), and no TV. A few days later, I still I knew nothing aside from the fact that something truly horrific and terrifying had happened.

Eventually, Mom and Dad shared some details, and for the next few months everything was tense. It felt like a thunderstorm was about to unleash its vehemence upon the entire world. We took extra care to lock all the doors and windows. Despite the bars on the windows, we felt insecure. Police presence and “secret agents” followed us everywhere. We could hear other people’s voices on our phone lines. We didn’t know what sort of backlashes we would go through. How would our host country friends treat us after this? How would our American friends treat us? Would we be forced to leave our new home?

Then, 3 long months later, a friend and teammate went separately, and to different places, to conferences and brought back a few Time magazines with pictures full of flames, fear, hate, anger, and bereavement. I remember beholding the glossy pages with a horrified astonishment. It was mind boggling for a mere 8 year old. I couldn’t understand why someone would want to do such a thing, causing so much death, fear, and anger in a far away country. I only understand that they did. I kept hearing things that told me those planes had lit more than buildings on fire. They’d been the sparks for the flames of war against a Muslim country closer to us than America. They’d lit a deep, soul shaking fear in most Americans of anything connected with Islam or the East. They’d lit a hate for Muslims for what they’d done. But I felt no connection to this emotion.

What were the effects on me personally? To be bluntly honest, there weren’t many effects. I was spared the agony of watching my country be shaken like a mouse in a cat’s mouth. Being so removed from the emotion of the travesty, I couldn’t pick up on any of it. There was none where I lived to pick up on. It was all removed from my family, unlike my aunt who lives in Washington DC, and saw the smoke from the Pentagon and lost a neighbor that day. No, I was more than 6,000 miles away. I smelled no smoke, felt no fear, nor saw the death that resulted. Maybe this sparing was something good for me, or maybe not. I don’t know.

A long-term effect of this event in history is a part of my adjustment back into American culture. The same friend I quoted at the beginning of the post also said, “That for you and me and our generation, 9/11 is our Pearl Harbor.” This is true; every generation goes through a world-changing event. Not being able to connect to the “Pearl Harbor” of my generation has impeded my abilities to connect to the people on this level. Another good friend of mine put this issue to words better than I can by saying “you want to feel like it's yours, but can't quite get there, and it leaves a hole on top of all the hole that's already there… It's hard for you to relate to people who don't have to deal with the same daily struggles.” 9/11 may not be an every day struggle, but it is not a shared one either.