Monday, September 11, 2006

A tribute to 9/11


I know it's much smaller but when I saw this tower the other day I immediately thought of the WTC, so I saved this photo for today. It's hard for me to believe it's been 5 years already, I can still clearly remember that day. I'd like to think that this kind of attack will never happen again although I know it's very unlikely. May we learn that good and bad does not mean the same thing all over the planet and accept it.

23 comments:

  1. Eric,

    Nice rememberance.

    I've been thinking of 911 more than usual this year as I am part of the 2,996 project.

    http://www.jamulian.com/db911/

    I don't know if many are aware of it or not. Every victim of 911 is being honored by a blogger.

    I have honored Brock Safronoff on my other (non photo) blog

    https://susansmusings.wordpress.com/

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  2. I think Eric touched a point that is very true: Good and evil are not interpreted the same way by all cultures, which doesn't mean that THEY are wrong. They just think different.
    And terrorist groups reacted because they felt their beliefs were threatened. I hope that peace can soon be achieved, so the innocent people (women and children) stop suffering the effects of war.
    I can clearly remember watching the towers fall on TV, many thousand Km away, and I also remember the feeling that our world was going to change. Pity that it did...

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  3. Good of you to do that, Eric.

    I don't think anyone in the States will ever forget 9/11. People only slightly older than me used to say they'd remember forever exactly what they were doing the day JFK was shot... I think this generation will remember that dark day of September for the rest of their lives, too. I know, I will.

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  4. Yes, I remember when I heard that JFK had been shot. I was a teenager in London. It seemed unthinkable.

    I remember—it seems so recent, but it really is five years ago—when the World Trade Center was hit and then the Pentagon, just two miles from where I live. It seemed more than unthinkable.

    I remember when I heard on the radio about the attacks in London, my home, just over a year ago. The unthinkable had already happened twice at least in my lifetime and countless times in history, so it seemed inevitable.

    I wish I didn't think about, wonder, and dread what's going to happen next. Our power to destroy becomes more and more lethal. And more inevitable. I wish we could live and let live.

    I'm a child of the sixties. How serious this sounded then. How innocent it seems now. We had no idea. When will we ever learn?

    WHERE HAVE ALL THE FLOWERS GONE
    words and music by Pete Seeger
    performed by Pete Seeger and Tao Rodriguez-Seeger

    Where have all the flowers gone?
    Long time passing
    Where have all the flowers gone?
    Long time ago
    Where have all the flowers gone?
    Girls have picked them every one
    When will they ever learn?
    When will they ever learn?

    Where have all the young girls gone?
    Long time passing
    Where have all the young girls gone?
    Long time ago
    Where have all the young girls gone?
    Taken husbands every one
    When will they ever learn?
    When will they ever learn?

    Where have all the young men gone?
    Long time passing
    Where have all the young men gone?
    Long time ago
    Where have all the young men gone?
    Gone for soldiers every one
    When will they ever learn?
    When will they ever learn?

    Where have all the soldiers gone?
    Long time passing
    Where have all the soldiers gone?
    Long time ago
    Where have all the soldiers gone?
    Gone to graveyards every one
    When will they ever learn?
    When will they ever learn?

    Where have all the graveyards gone?
    Long time passing
    Where have all the graveyards gone?
    Long time ago
    Where have all the graveyards gone?
    Covered with flowers every one
    When will we ever learn?
    When will we ever learn?

    ©1961 (Renewed) Fall River Music Inc
    All Rights Reserved.

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  5. Thanks for the tribute, Eric.....

    Today there were many unity walks in Washington DC...seeing people of all different backgrounds and ideologies walking together down the streets gave me a chill....

    Despite all the things that are going on, I never forget about the humanity that unites us all as human beings.

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  6. Thanks for the tribute Eric. Your readers might be interested in this article in the Guardian: Chirac Sends Bush Sept. 11 Message

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  7. A very nice picture eric but a better commentary. Lets home we do not see this kind of actions again real soon.

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  8. Of course I myself remember so well what I was doing at that moment, and how I felt. What's more I remember I ordered pizzas for dinner and invited friends to follow the news. And yes I felt really weird doing so, like millions of people at that very same time : both anguished, traumatized and… disgustingly "voyeur". Today, as there are so many documentaries about it on every channel, I still wonder about the mixed feelings : remembrance, respect, voyeurism and sorrow.
    Sorrow above all…

    (I guess I'll be lucky if I don't get insults about that pizza story as a reward, but be sure I didn't aim to be insulting neither at that time doing so, nor today telling it)

    Michael : about yesterday's pic, sorry but nothing interesting or even just nasty to add. I guess all has been written already. Just one thing may be : sympathy for Eric and his perseverance, "malgré tout" !

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  9. now that u mentioned it, i was having tea w/ some friends about midnight when we got the news..shocking! we've survived the 5 years (dont forget 7/7) Pray that such an event will not occur again ..unlikely, but hope is all we've got (?)

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  10. I wish too that acts like that does not happen ever, ever again.

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  11. Thanks, Passante, for the paroles. Being of a much older generation, I still hear Marlene Dietrich singing the song. With Marlene's voice, much like that of Juliette Greco, it makes me shiver with emotion. When will we ever learn?

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  12. It was a very sad day, and i'm sure everyone will agree that it is something we don't want to happen again. My prayers are for all of us!

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  13. It was after midnight in Australia when the towers came down. My husband and I watched all night the live feed coming in from the US over the television. Our Prime Minister was over in Washington when the pentagon was hit. It was so unreal.
    I was in Paris the following year and i remember the two huge blue lights the city beamed up like the towers at night in rememberence.

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  14. Do you all get a little shock when you see the towers in a movie made before Sept 2001?

    This photo links thematically with the immigration demonstration of yesterday. Gg, the pizza story is perfect--perfectly absurd, as much of life is. Beliefs, values, emotion. I don't remember the exact quote or who said it, but "nothing that humans do is inhuman". By definition, oui? What is humane? People can be really evil. Remember that people also can be truly wonderful.

    Thank you for the tribute, Eric.

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  15. Thanks from me as well, eric.

    I'll add my memories to this too. I didn't know much of what was going on until the evening of 9/11. I got up and got ready for work as usual, and when I got to work I knew something was going on. But I workd in a daycare and my boss didn't want us listening to the radio on the news and having our fears and anxieties transfer to the kids. So we got all of our info from the parents who came in early to pick up their kids. The first on to pick up her kid in my room was a lawyer who worked in the tallest building in downtown St. Louis. The second word had spread about the first tower falling the building was evacuated.

    When I finally got home I turned on the news, of course, and watched and cried. Especially because my little brother had enlisted in the Army and was due to ship out for basic training a few days later. I was definately scared.

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  16. I remember that I was taking consumer calls at the time for a pet food company. A woman from New York City called to tell me that her dog didn't like a certain treat she had bought. Then in the midst of the conversation she said that she was very near the building that had just been hit by a plane. She said she probably should be worrying about something else but she just had to call. It was kind of surreal after that. Our office closed for the day and they evacuated people from Pittsburgh. I was very thankful that I had moved into a non-descript building from the United States Steel Tower a week earlier. It is the tallest building between NYC and Chicago. Of course that building was quickly evacuated. In the days that followed, what I remember the most is the quiet in sky when the planes were grounded. Thanks, Eric, for letting us all remember that terrible day and our hopes for the future.

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  17. Remember not only the 3,000 Americans who vanished five years ago, but the 60,000 plus civilian Afghans and Iraqis killed by the stupidity of the Bush administration in the following five years. Unlike the repeated replays and publications of images at the World Trade Center, not many images of how these people suffered and died, and how their families grieved were ever seen. These people existed, suffered or died as innocently as the Americans; their fate was sealed on that same day but there is no memorial, no books, TV programmes and movies to remember them. I hope they are not forgotton by the world.

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  18. Lavender Lady, you said it well: the good people don't get the attention the bad do. And, Lisi, it's important to remember all innocent victims of war and rampage. Some jerks deserve to...go away, but most who suffer in war do not deserve it. Sometimes all we can do is help the person with the baby, feel bad for others, and yes, eat pizza.

    My planning board chairman wanted to cancel a public meeting the night after the attack. I told him no, we may be a small piece of government, of society, but we must continue. If we are disrupted and don't try to keep going, then those b_____ds win. Don't let them win. Keep living, keep functioning. We were all sad, but we held the meeting as scheduled.

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  19. Thanks everyone for sharing your memories. It's very touching actually. GG I also like this idea that you feel you have to apologize for ordering pizza while watching the news as if you were watching football. It almost sound obscene and though it's nothing but normal.

    Lisi has a point also I must say. Some deaths are worth more than others obviously. Why is it that "we" don't feel the same about this 3 000 American people who disappeared that day and the thousands of Iraqis and Afghans?

    And Jeff I like the way you reacted; I think you're right; keeping on as if there had been no attacks is the best way we can fight.


    And Jeff I like the way you reacted; I think you're right; keeping on as if there had been no attacks is the best way we can fight.

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  20. Eric - Beautiful reflections in your building photo, and in everyone's comments. That morning we awoke to the sounds of our neighbor's house being on fire, so with our local tragedy, our attention was diverted until in the car taking children to school. In the few short minutes to school what we heard on NPR made me think the US might be under general attack of war, the information was scattered and incomplete and the Pentagon had just been hit. I thought it best to keep things normal and that a school would be an unlikely target for attack, so did the school drop off, then headed a block away to another parent's home to see if they were sending kids to school. . .they hadn't heard anything and we stood there anxious and not knowing what to do. Oh, the second guessing one does when you don't know what has happened or the scope of it. I got to work and a co-worker was hysterical because her sister was a flight attendent with a flight from NY to SF that morning, and she had just heard that the vice president had ordered a highjacked airliner to be shot down. That's the information we had as we started our day in the SF Bay Area of California on a beautiful September morning.
    -Kim

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  21. On 9-11 I was at work, then on the phone to loved ones, and as quickly as possible at home to be near those I love.

    I am pleased to be part of the Daily Photo family because we are bringing the world closer together one photo at a time.

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