5 years....

It's been 5 years already... Time flies so fast. 5 years ago of today, September 11, 2001, I was in San Diego, studying at Grossmont College. It was after 3 months after I started my new life in the States. I still vividly remember the morning of Sep 11, 2001, collapse of the Twin Towers in NYC. A friend of mine from high school was visiting me at that time and he was supposed to go back to Japan a few days after the incident. That morning, I turned on my computer after I woke up and checked e-mail as usual. Then, some of my friends sent me e-mail asking me whether I was all right or not. I didn't know why the were worried. In one of their e-mail, there was one phrase that attracted my attention, "USA is in a big trouble". I turned on the TV then I saw the smoke coming out from skyscrapers. At first, I thought the scene was from some movies or something. But when I saw the headline, I was shocked. It was real. A week before the incident, another friend of mine from Japan stopped by my place for a few days and left to NY for study. I was so worried about him and tried to call him to make sure that he was all right. However, I wasn't able to catch him until next day. That day, some classes at college were cancelled, and the next day the college had closed due to the rumor that the next target would be universities. Everyone was talking about the attack. All the programs were showing the moment of the second airplane crushing into one of the Twin Tower, the collapse of both towers and people who were trapped in NYC, running away from the towers. I still remeber the sound, faces, scene of the moment. Even though I was actually not there, only watching it through TV, the images and sounds I saw and heared are inscribed in my mind. I can never forget them.

It's been 5 years since then. I never thought that I would be here 5 years ago, studying again in another country. My campus life will finish soon. I really wonder where I will be in 5 years from now. Will I be in Singapore or Japan? Or some other countries?