From: "David Simon Bendory" To: "Schelly Dardashti" References: <3BA6F255.9531BE13@barak-online.net> <02aa01c14167$7307ea20$64fa1dc7@david> <3BAA07FB.243E1F60@barak-online.net> Subject: Re: Your siddur Date: Fri, 21 Sep 2001 00:07:18 -0400 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.50.4807.1700 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.50.4807.1700 I had a harrowing experience that day. My car needed service, so I was late getting in. I decided that I might as well make it a late day and go to the gym first. The gym is at 10 Hanover Square (another Goldman building), which is on the East Side just south west of South Street Seaport. I had finished my workout (5 mile run) when someone came in & told us to turn on CNN, that a small plane had accidentally flown into the WTC and it was on fire. I saw the images & called my wife to tell her that there was an accident, that everything was fine, and that I expected to proceed from the gym to a normal day at work. A few minutes after that, we saw the second explosion. I knew this was no accident or coincidence (CNN didn't know at first that it was a second airplane), but rather a terrorist attack. Self-preservation fight-or-flight kicked in. I tried to call my wife to tell her I was coming home, but the phone lines were already dead. (The gym is in a basement level, so no cell phones.) I quickly showered & dressed, then headed out to the street. By the time I got to the street, there were 100s of people milling about. I saw 2 people from my floor at One Liberty who informed me that the building had been evacuated and that they were told to report to another Goldman office (we have a number of locations in the financial district), and would I like to join them? No thank you, I'm going home. Are the subways running? No. I quickly surmised that the ferry at the World Financial Center was the only way to NJ, and that things were going to get much worse, though I couldn't anticipate how. It was clear that being stuck in the financial district was not a good idea. I ran -- literally -- about a mile to the ferry. Probably my fastest mile ever, and I chanted tehillim as I ran. Often, when I run, I think that I could outrun anyone who chased me, that if the Nazis came I would run away. Well, here they were, and I outran them. As I ran to the ferry, I passed 1000s of people milling about aimlessly. Some were simply foolish -- hanging out in Battery Park, taking pictures, shooting the amateur video you watched on CNN. Others were dazed and didn't know what to do. Mothers evacuated from Battery Park City carried babies in their arms as they walked south... to where? While Americans foolishly wondered why there was no cell service, I put my cell phone on auto-dial to my wife. Though I had no personal experience, I knew all about cell phone outages and jammed circuits during attacks in Israel. A park official stopped me as I ran north through Battery Park through the crowd streaming south. "We're evacuating; you can't go north." "I'm getting on the ferry to NJ... there it is!" I pointed to the water. She turned to look and I ran past in the other direction. I got to the ferry just in time to see an empty ferry pull out of the dock. I stood about 5-6 people deep in line & wondered why the ferry was empty. While we waited for another ferry to pull in, I caught my breath and pulled out my siddur and continued chanting tehillim. The crowed thickened around me quickly as others realized that leaving the city was a good idea. The NY Mercantile Exchange closed for the day and its 100s of employees and brokers streamed into the area. We all stood watching the WTC burn and I saw the images that haunted me for days: people falling, jumping, blown out, I don't know what. Debris was falling, and some of the debris was burning, and as it fell I saw that it wasn't debris, that it was people, arms and legs flailing through the air as they plummeted. The crowd gasped. I turned my back. Were they falling or jumping? What goes through a person's mind in a 1000 degree fire on the 100th floor with no way out? I later thought that some of them must have jumped, and that in the brief seconds in the air they must have experienced exhilarating freedom and relief from the inferno. I saw a dozen people jump in the few minutes I waited for the ferry. There was a commotion and the crowd slowly parted. An injured man was walked through. Covered with a white sheet, his face bloody, one side blackened, he walked through the crowd to the dock. There was some kind of altercation ahead of me. A minute later, as a ferry pulled in, a police man came through the crowd. The altercation grew louder. The crowd began to enter the dock and board the ferry. I heard the altercation as I passed: Policeman: "How many people does this ferry hold?" Ferry operator: "399." Policeman: "You will load 399 persons onto this boat. You will not ask for tickets. You will continue to load boat after boat with 399 people and evacuate them to NJ until I tell you to do otherwise." I was surprised at how orderly New Yorkers were as we loaded the boat. Silently, dazed, with no instructions, we all boarded, moved to the front of the boat, made room for others. I continued to chant tehillim, and now added tefillat ha-derech. I was drenched from sweat from the run, from stress, from panic. As the ferry crosses the Hudson, there is a brief minute or two when it passes behind the Statue of Liberty and the Twin Towers are blocked from view. We saw the Twin Towers standing... then passed behind Lady Liberty... then emerged to see one tower and enough smoke to obscure the area where the second tower should have been. We heard nothing -- the ferry was too loud. Why would there be smoke at the base? The fire was up top. Only after we unloaded in Hoboken and heard people talking did we learn that the South Tower had collapsed. I got onto a train which quickly filled and left. I continued saying tehillim. When I would pause here and there, everyone around me -- Jew, Christian, Indian (I couldn't identify any Muslims on sight), Black, White -- nodded, thanked me, told me it was beautiful, asked me to pray more. Everyone is religious in a war. Some on the train cried; someone read news reports aloud from a pager; one person got a cell phone call through and we all provided our home numbers so that the person on the land line on the other end could call home for us. I arrived home at 11:00, some 2 hours after I learned of the first attack. Once I was home, fight or flight ceased. I collapsed on the floor, hysterical crying. I cried on and off all day Tuesday, the images of people jumping passed before my eyes over and over. I played with my son, tossed his Barney up in the air with him and saw people falling from the Twin Towers. I cried the deep crying of a mourner in shock, in aninut. In the thunderstorm a few nights later, I awoke seeing the WTC explode before my eyes. Everyone I know called that day. People I hadn't spoken to for months. All our Israeli family. "Ha-Olam hafuch," I told them. You are calling me to see if I'm OK. My world is still upside-down. My office is a wreck. The windows were blown in by the shock wave from the South Tower collapse (I assume). Everything is covered with dust and debris. But the building stood, and the credenza stood, and the siddur sat protected for a week awaiting its rescue. As someone on soc.genealogy.jewish remarked, the siddur is a survivor, and it will survive this, too. I plan on inscribing this story inside it to add a literal page to its history. David ----- Original Message ----- From: "Schelly Dardashti" To: "David Simon Bendory" Sent: Thursday, September 20, 2001 11:15 AM Subject: Re: Your siddur > Dear David: > I know that it is hard to describe what you and others > went through last week, I would very much appreciate it > if you could offer some personal observations of what > you experienced, what you have seen in the rescue and > recovery stages, any remarks on how NYC pulls together > in the face of adversity (as a NYer born and bred, I > know, but this one isn't about me!!!). I have spoken to > friends and family about their experiences and have > been glued to the television for almost all of the > first week, 23 hours a day, and I know what you mean by > not having the words.