September 11th- my personal experience and view of it

Today is September 11^th.

I’m not a hypocrite. There are worse massacres that happened in the world before and after, and I don’t keep track of all of the dates they happened on.  But I can somehow relate to this one personally. I didn’t lose anyone, but I got a taste of the fear. My family and I were less than two hours away when it happened. My mom pulled me out of school for fear that they would start bombing important sites, including schools. At that moment, nobody knew what was happening: we all were watching those images on TV, but we didn’t know what was coming next. We panicked. My brother and I hid in the basement. My mom stayed in the car with the car radio on. My dad left to donate blood at a hospital, because they were preparing for survivors.

This was perhaps the first thing that happened to me that showed me that maybe, the world was a darker place than I thought it to be.

The second thing it showed me was the universal hate against Americans. My brother and I have both learned later: while out of the United States, don’t speak English in the streets. Never tell people you’re American unless you’ve gained their trust. Use a Brazilian passport for identification.

And thirdly, it began to shape me into the person I am today. I wrote a letter addressing President Bush, and gave him my entire savings (a mere 17 dollars) because my mom said that he asked for kids to donate a buck or two to ‘America’s fund for Afghanistan’s children’. I wrote a letter to the French president, asking that he come to America’s aid. I started keeping up with the news. I started asking: Why?

So today’s date is burned in my memory. I pray not only for those who died on this date, but those who died on all the other massacres, too.  I want to be their voice. I want to make a tiny difference in the world, and things like this pushes me forward every day.

This was me on Halloween, 2001.