I wake but linger in bed. Do I really have to go to the 8am lecture at uni today?
Mum comes through the bedroom door, as she usually does when I'm reluctant to wake up. "Have you heard the news?"
"No."
"Terrorists have flown planes into the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon."
My first thought goes to The Lone Gunmen television series. It had premièred on TV mere weeks earlier, and the first episode involved a plane flying into one of the Twin Towers. My jaw begins to sink. Then my thoughts go to friends of our family who live in New York's outer suburbs.
Local time is 14 hours ahead of New York: while it's 6am on 12 Sept here, in New York it's 8pm on 11 Sept. I shower, dress and come to the breakfast table: Dad is already there, eating his toast as he looks at the front page. The picture is of a single smoking tower; the text talks of the simultaneous attack on the Pentagon. The paper speaks of the death and destruction: I can't read it as it's too painful.
The drive to university is accompanied by the sound of the news radio. The poor DJ is trying to find the words to describe the news to the listeners. He interviews an American expatriate: she want her government to find the perpetrators and "bomb the shit out of them". Her tone is full of hate and vengeance.
The Premier comes on: after the standard recitals and condolences, the DJ asks if this will affect the upcoming Commonwealth Heads Of Government Meeting that's scheduled to occur in his capital. Like a flummoxed telemarketer, the Premier repeats "democracy is like a flower: it needs the light of day to flourish" to any of the difficult questions. I turn the radio off.
My classmates assemble for that pesky 8am lecture: Introduction To Networks, part of the first-year Bachelor of Information Technology course. This morning's greeting is invariably "Have you heard the news?" So far the only images we've seen are of one scarred, smoking tower with its mate pristine; or pictures of the second plane striking the intact tower. Someone says the towers are still standing; another says one is standing but the other is a jagged stalagmite. The lecturer arrives and announces the start of class "on this sombre morning". We all know the show must go on.
Two hours later the lecture finishes. I have some time before my next lecture, and I know there's always a projector broadcasting CNN in a large public area in the business faculty. I walk there to hear more: a crowd has gathered, standing and watching the endless repeats of the planes striking the buildings. Slowly the facts emerge: simultaneous hijacks by kamikaze attackers; the horrid collapse of both towers with rescue workers still inside; the fourth plane scheduled for Congress or the White House.
As I watch the plane strike the second tower for the umpteenth time, I think how this is something that is only supposed to happen in dystopian films. Bush The Younger has announced military action against both terrorists and "those who harbour them". More than ever, I fear what his leadership will mean for the world.
I can't remember what happened at my other classes during that day. The standard greeting of "Have you heard the news?" is eventually answered with "Hard to miss it."
By the evening, every TV station broadcasting has suspended normal programming to play more repeats of the tragedy. The one station that didn't is playing bad sitcoms. The images seen during the day mean I can't read, can't play video games.... We type an e-mail to our family friends in New York, sending our best wishes and hopes. There is now nothing more to be done, other than try to survive.
