In memory of 9-11

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Korin_Mari

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Every year on this day, we are reminded of the thousands that have lost their lives on that tragic day and how the current war has begun. Forgetting the numerous conspiracy theories and whatever anger people may hold in their hearts, I would like to take this moment to put those feelings aside. Please keep in mind everyone lost something that day, whether it be friends, family, business, homes or a sense of peace.

I still remember being in my 7th grade English class when the buildings were attacked. My teacher walked in very calmly, told all students who had parents around the WTC area to call them. I didn’t know why I was calling, but I went to the teacher’s office to call my mother (Ms. Kawano). She was fine and sheltering people in the store.

School decided to let students out at noon, and the principal had all students leave with a parent. (It was a small private school, so this was actually possible.) I waited for someone to come get me, as I sat watching the news in complete disbelief. I was just there, buying rice balls at the small Asian convenience store. How could it be just gone? It didn’t even go up into flames and have some grand finale... It just disappeared into ashes.

To add to my surprise, it was my mother who came to pick me up. She apparently walked 4 miles to get home, then came to get me with my stepfather by car. When I got home, I went to the top floor of the building to find many residents looking off into the distance to see the dark smoke where the buildings once stood. After a month of the event, the school had an all day assembly and all of the students who lost someone spent the day expressing their sorrows. Students sat in silent denial, some were quietly ranting their anger to their friends, others sat in tears, but most didn’t know how to feel.

Korin is located only blocks away from the WTC, so of course we were in the frozen zone for a year. The authorities let the employees grab computers and anything else we might need after some time. Korin had no office, no showroom, and a portion of our inventory was still in the basement. We made a makeshift office at my house and visited customers with products. Thankfully, Korin has a warehouse in New Jersey or else we would have faced the same fate as the hundreds of other small businesses in the area.

Anyways, my point is... No matter who you are or where you may be, my heart goes out to you. I hope you find triple the amount of happiness to make up for any pieces that went missing.

Thank you for reading my very sentimental post. :)

Where were you when the 9-11 attack happened?
 
I didn't realize Korin had been so directly affected...this was long before my interest in fine cutlery. Those are touching memories, thanks for sharing.
 
Thanks, Mari.

I was living in Syracuse, NY at the time. The day before it happened my roommate and sous chef said, "lets go to the city tomorrow and look for new jobs." I said," okay " and we made an appointment at Windows on the World restaurant in the World Trade center for a 9am interview with Chef Michael Lomanaco. We were going to get an hours or so worth of sleep and drive straight through. we figured we would go up to the observation deck before the interview to look around. When I got up to get ready to go, my roommate said he didn't feel very well and that he wanted to reschedule the appointment. I figured I would wait until 8am and give The restaurant a call and let them know we couldn't make it. When I called Christine answered the phone and said," I'm glad you called, Chef has to go pick up his prescription glasses and will be late." I told her we had to reschedule and she said," no problem."
I went back to sleep. At about 9 am there was a pounding on the front door, I got up and answered it and it was my neighbor and he was in a panic. He yelled" good you haven't left yet, I thought you guys were goners!" I said, "What are you talking about?" " turn on the tv." Right when I turned on the tv the second plane hit. It was 9:03am. I do believe Windows on the World lost 79 of it's employees that day. Including Christine Olender the manager I talked to that morning. may they and there families find peace
 
Thank you for sharing, all of you. I commuted daily through the subway station in the bottom of the WTC, and worked in the adjacent World Financial Center until '93. I had long since left NYC by 9-11, but still had many friends there. Sadly one of my college roomates was lost that day. My heart goes out to anyone touched by this and to all the brave souls who helped us carry on.
 
Thanks for sharing everyone. Truly the saddest day of my lifetime.
 
From 1997-1999 I did a post doc at the University of Rhode Island. At the end of that time, I flew my parents and my brother in to spend some vacation time in the US. That was their biggest trip ever, they were very nervous and exited. They got there just fine, we had a great first day, and then on the second day we got a call that Grandma died and we all went back to Germany the next day - a very frustrating experience for all of us.

In 2001, I was back in Germany but I had spent the summer working at the University of Rhode Island again. At the end of the summer I arranged for my parents to come over to make up for that missed vacation of 1999. They flew in, we spent a great weekend in NYC, walked around and inside the WTC on Sunday evening. Monday morning I got them on a guided bus tour for a week, did a little shopping in the city. In the afternoon I was wondering whether I should stay another night or drive down to my friends in Philly where I wanted to wait for my parents to finish the tour. I decided to go to Philly. That was Sep 10, 2001.

I was fortunate enough, not to have friends in the towers, but my Philly friends had, so this was a tense time. My parents were in a bus full of traumatized Germans driving around the Northeast, and the guide and driver were nervous wrecks because they were from the city and didn't reach anybody for some time. The bus was the last one to make it back into the US from the Canadian side of the Niagara falls before they closed the borders. I finally picked up my parents somewhere on the bus route and we spent the next few weeks together. Not the happiest vacation I ever had. And when I moved to Hawaii, my parents initially didn't want to come visit me, they said that every time they come, people die...

I feel deeply for everybody affected by this trauma. But, to be honest, I was also frightened and angered by the reactions to it - and I am saying that from a non-American perspective: First, I remember when Bush came on TV the first time and talked about an act of war. I was screaming at the TV: "It's NOT an act of war, it's a CRIME!" Had he listened to me, a few tens of thousand of lives in a country that didn't have anything to do with it might have been spared... As a German, I am also deeply suspicious about extreme nationalism because I know where that can take a nation, and I saw plenty of that in the weeks after 9/11, and a lot of that looked frightening to me. And several of my friends got harassed in public by people who could not tell an Indian from an Arab, also not something I liked to see.

Overall, it was an intense time, and I am glad I could be around family and friends during the first weeks. I feel for everyone who lost family or friends in the event.

Stefan
 
We where stationed at Ft Irwin CA at the time. I was home playing EQ when all of a sudden other players around the world started saying (typing) "I'm so sorry for you all in the US right now". I thought that was an odd thing to say, so I turned on the news, not something I like doing, and saw the second impact. It was all pretty much a blur for the rest of the day. I'm glad I didn't know anyone directly involved with losses but as a vetran I was deeply moved and not to crazy with the way our gvt responded but I did understand it, still don't like it...

I don't give a squat about how someone looks or what their customs are, I do care about how someone behaves. Anyone denounceing a race, lifestyle, or culture is just plane wrong. I have no problem with going after those directly involved and executing them. But to react by taking aggression onto anyone that looks or acts different than us is just plane wrong. For that I am not happy with this counties pollicies. But that is for another thread...

Korin, thanks for the post and experience.
 
Thank you all for sharing your stories and I'm very sorry for your losses.

So many people were effected by this event in one way or another, but it's important to never let anger get the best of you. As DwarvenChef said, a person should always be judged based on how they behave, not what they happened to be.
 
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