I woke up for classes as usual, but when my roommae turned on the TV, I saw a burning Trade Center, and felt fear like I have never experienced before. We had been hit at home. I saw it at 9:11am on 9/11 of 2001. It was a frightening feeling coming to the realization of the eerieness of those numbers. I had a bad habit of looking at the clock when it read 9:11, but this is the first time that really meant that there was emergency in the air.

I watched the chaos unfold through tear-welled eyes. I felt my body in a kind of suspended animation. A few minutes would pass and I would whisper, "Oh my God. Why?..." I stayed that way for almost a half an hour.

The day passed in fear wrapped up in questions of, "What next? How? Are we safe? Why?" Classes dragged on through the torture-filled hours of the day. As though my mind was bogged down with thick mud made of fear and blood, my mind kept projecting out of my body looking at myself and the others around me. Like trying to look past something in disbelief with my jaw down to my knees.

I was in a constant state of fear and inquery. In a sense, the terrorists did their job; they made me afraid. All I could do was pray for those whose lives had been ripped apart by the acts of a few. A few cowards who were waging a war somewhere else in the world and decided to bring us into it. There was a man being interviewed who said, "...keep your war over there. Don't bring it here." Tears rolled down is face and across a shaking jaw.

Today, the effects of yesterday still linger in the back of my mind. Though not as intense as the day before, but still vivid. We all need to stand strong against the evil of the world. We can't let the cowards and low-lives of the world intimidate us. We are such a strong country that any rouge group of radicals has no hope of succeeding in bringing us down. As President Bush said, we will "hunt down" these people, and they will be brought to justice. I'm sure that justice will have no mercy on the guilty.

I watched as ignorant people in the Middle East, brainwashed by a government that claimed we were the ultimate evil in the world, danced and cheered in the streets. Young boys and teenagers, women, and an old woman singing for joy crowded the streets. I have never been so appauled in all my life. At that instant, two thoughts ran through my mind. One was the thought of a massive missle landing in the middle of that crowd and taking out everyone on the screen. Everyone in sight would be gone. The other thought was that these were people who had been manipulated by politicians who were the epitomy of evil and corruptiveness. I don't want to make excuses for them, but they are ignorant and would follow whatever some leader said if it meant a better life for them.

And that's just what they were attacking. A country that was a symbol of economic success and freedom. I'm sure that they were angry because they hadn't had the success that we have accomplished. We have because we have had high morals, worked together, and worked as a whole people, not many tiny groups. This country is a giant family. And when a relative dies, we all feel it. We all greive, because we lost a part of the unity that we hold dear to our hearts.