In Memoriam of 9-11-2001

Hey, there is Japanese from Nishinomiya visiting my Blog? What an honour! A pity he didn’t leave a comment… He/she probably doesn’t understand English, huh… Anyway, I’ve promised myself that English will forever be the sole language used in my Blog, regardless of how high my proficiency in Japanese, French, or other languages are in years to come, unless there is no other choice such as when writing a Haiku in Japanese or writing a Sajak in Indonesian… My primary reason is that I want my blog to be a Global Blog: being understood by as wide range of people and nations as possible.

Now let’s get to the main topic.

Today is the day we remember those dead in the four airplane crashes in three cities in America… Nope, I ain’t kidding here! I really am going to make a personal commemoration today, around 7.46 PM (Jakarta Time)

I still remember in detail how I found out abt the shocking news.

Precisely 6 yrs ago I still lived w/ my uncle’s family in Ciputat while my parents and my sis Mary lived in Surabaya. Around 8 PM that day, I turned the channel to MetroTV (an Indonesian news-oriented channel) to watch my fave show: “Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction”

Instead of watching the show on TV, there is this news, seemingly a “Breaking News”, with the announcer babbling endlessly. I lowered the TV volume. No pic was being shown, so I almost shouted out in pain, “WTF?!!! I’ve waited this show for a week and now they’re changing it for some irrelevant tripe!!!”

I almost flicked the channel in distress when was shown the record of how the first plane struck the north tower.

“Hmm… where have I seen that building before?”, I asked myself.

Then the TV announcer mentioned WTC.

I loudened the TV volume.

“What the… I’ve been there! But it can’t be…”

Then I laughed. I really laughed mirthfully. What a joke!

The next second, I realised at once: that day was not April Fools’.

Oops.

It probably wasn’t a joke at all. I felt guilty having laughed at it.

Then images flashed my mind of how I remember WTC back in 1996, when I was a 6-year-old boy:

Mom and Dad entered that building; taller than even the Monas in Jakarta. I was told to stay in the car – a rented one – parked right across the street from the twin buildings.

I looked in amazement to the building, how I’d like to enter it one day. When Mom and Dad came back, I asked them what they were doing there.

Just finishing up some business, they said. I didn’t ask them to bring me inside the building that time, but I promised myself that I’d go visit it myself when I were older.

And that’s the first time and the last time I’d ever had a direct glimpse of the WTC.

That childhood promise would never be fulfilled then.

Over the next few days I noticed how it made the world headlines; even the
usually-sex-crime-crap-filled Pos Kota newspaper put the WTC news on the front page. Usually Indonesian ppl only buy sports tabloids (for men) and fashion magazines (for women). But for around a week that time, everybody, everywhere in unison suddenly read newspaper intensely: an occurrence rarely sighted in Indonesia.

On Friday that week, I realised how I had forgotten completely that my former classmate in SD Don Bosco Pondok Indah, Samuel, was residing in New York. I then e-mailed him, asking how things are.

Good news.

He and his family are OK.

How fortunate things turned out for him, eh.. ^^