Chapter 6 talk about strain

"More than 200 of our team members went in to fight the fire. The building collapsed and they were all trapped inside. Our chief and deputy chief may have all died inside. Can we survive?" child!The more disasters and blows we face, the stronger we must be and the less weeping, because tears make you unable to see the enemy clearly, and tears are only likely to suffer more fatal injuries. child!This is youth, and this is exactly the attitude young people should have in the face of disasters.So, seeing the collapse of the World Trade Center today, we think that tomorrow, a greater building will stand here.

A Nightmare of 9/11 Child, today you are frightened. In the morning, in the middle of class, two of your classmates were picked up at home.Not long after, the teacher was called to a meeting, walked back to the classroom very slowly, and announced to you solemnly: "Our World Trade Center and the Pentagon were attacked by terrorists, and many people were killed and injured." Calm down, saying that the school will strengthen security checks, and that the school has already called the parents to inform the parents that after the meeting is over, the parents must sign before they can pick up the child.

When class was over, my mother went and saw many children and their families embracing at the door, and some children kept looking out because their families didn't come.The mother asked the teacher why he had to sign it before letting the child go home. Is it because he is afraid that there will be terrorists in the school? The teacher replied in a low voice: "We are afraid that parents with children who work together in the World Trade Center will not be able to come, or they will never be able to come back. If this is unfortunate, we have to leave the children to take care of them."

All day, your mom and I are on the phone, trying to connect with every conceivable relative or friend who works at the World Trade Center. Let's call your third uncle first, and your cousin picked it up, saying that Uncle San hasn't come home yet, but he has escaped from the 60th floor of the World Trade Center.Then we called a friend in the same community. She cried and said that she had gone to the office the other day and was at home today because of business, but the office was gone, and more than a dozen employees could not be contacted. We also called your classmate's mother. She said that because her husband was the boss, she left late and was still on the train, but the entire office was destroyed. Fortunately, all the staff escaped.I also thought of Uncle Jiang who had dinner with you on your father-in-law’s birthday the day before yesterday. His elder brother worked in the World Trade Center, so he called; his father-in-law answered the call, saying that he was on the 100th floor, the first building that was bombed. , Uncle Jiang was crying on the sofa.

You have been to the World Trade Center, and we have brought many friends from China there.Not too long ago, I took a picture of it overlooking Manhattan. By the way, when we flew back to New York from Quebec, Canada last week, the plane flew past the World Trade Center. Didn’t I still point it out for you to see? I don’t know how many planes pass by there every day. Who would have thought that they were hijacked by terrorists and used to Suicide attacks; who would have thought that the World Trade Center, which we "New Yorkers" are so proud of, would disappear in such a short period of time.

Watching the images of crashes and collapses broadcast on TV, we all felt like a dream, and couldn't believe that everything in front of us was real.For you, that is an even more unacceptable picture. No! I should say that for all Americans, this picture is thrilling and enough to awaken the "American Dream".In the past hundred years, including the two world wars, even the Pearl Harbor incident took place in Hawaii outside the United States. How often have Americans experienced such an attack on their own "mainland"? Have you ever seen such a beacon? I may have used the word "beacon" too deeply, but today you see flames rising into the sky, thick smoke and dust flying, and the former glorious World Trade Center, only the metal gates are left slantingly standing among the ruins. In the ruins piled up like a small hill, there are still thousands of kind-hearted people.

This is Beacon! Sanbo, who took the elevator from the 60th floor to the 40th floor, and then rushed down the stairs, said that he was covered in dust, and he ran far away first, but he didn't want to believe his eyes, so he walked back and saw The whole building collapsed.He said that where the building was hit, the steel frame and metal exterior walls were all burned red because of the flames, and it was believed that this softened the weight of the forty or fifty floors above, which suddenly fell down. When the building collapsed, he turned around and ran again, but he felt a hot wind rushing from behind, and the smell was something he had never smelled in his life, and he would never forget it in his life.

What shocked me even more was that he said: "You can't see it on TV. People climbed on the upper part of the windows of the burning building, and then they couldn't hold it anymore, and jumped down one by one..." At night, we stayed in front of the TV, and the phone kept ringing, all of which were calls from relatives and friends all over the United States.After more than ten hours of dialing, they finally connected. They first asked if we had any losses, and then asked if we had any food. It can be seen that the shock caused by this horrible incident has made everyone regard New York as a battlefield.

They may not have expected that the people on this battlefield showed amazing calmness and perseverance.The president of a Chinese company surnamed Fu broke his femur while escaping. The bone pierced through the muscle, bleeding profusely, and he seemed unable to escape, but two white men picked him up in time and rushed out.Because the World Trade Center is next to Chinatown, we Chinese also showed love, provided food and water to those who escaped, helped them clean, and borrowed their phones to call relatives and friends. Lower Manhattan was immediately evacuated, but at the same time, many people rushed there, including doctors, nurses, firefighters and various volunteers.Many people are still on vacation, but they rushed to the rescue. The firefighters were even more touching. One said to the reporter:

"More than 200 of our team members went in to fight the fire. The building collapsed and they were all trapped inside. Our chief and deputy chief may have all died inside. Can we survive?" Times Square, which is usually the busiest place, was empty, and all the restaurants on the square had their iron gates pulled down. There was only one restaurant, which provided free food for rescuers; the Broadway theater, which always had long queues, was also empty, but there was another kind of queue. Long, around the corner - everyone lined up to donate blood, and there were so many people that there were not enough blood bags.

Looking at those touching pictures, we couldn't help wiping away our tears secretly. Your mother probably wiped too much, and her eyelids were a little infected, and she didn't feel like saying it, so she said that she was probably on fire and needed to pick a needle. Perhaps we are all influenced by Western culture! You can hide and cry secretly, but try to bear it and don't cry in front of others. Isn’t it? Look! Those people on TV with blood on their faces, those holding photos of relatives, begging everywhere, asking for help; their voices are mournful, but we hardly saw a single person crying bitterly. Children! The more we face disasters and blows, the stronger we must be and the less weeping, because we can't see the enemy clearly with tearful eyes, and we may only encounter more fatal injuries. We can't be pessimistic. Even if we have the most tragic experience, we must think positively. That's why you saw President Bush Jr. used a lot of "thank you" in his national broadcast, thanking Americans for their solidarity and the world for their care.After announcing the focus of the alert, the government spokesperson added a special sentence - "I hope that the sacrifice of tens of millions of people this time can be exchanged for the survival of more people in the future." Child! You are already a teenager, and you are almost as tall as your mother.After you pass your thirteenth birthday, mentally, it is time to enter the realistic period from the fantasy period, and you begin to face a real world. Tonight, I held you on my lap, and while watching the scene of disasters on TV, I said with emotion: "Life is hard, so we should work harder. Life is hard, so why don't we take it easy?" (Life is hard, so we should work harder. Difficult, we have to redouble our efforts; life is hard, why not take it easy.) Then when I ask you, which sentence do you think is more correct, you say without thinking, "Of course we have to redouble our efforts. " Great! Children! This is youth, and this is the attitude that young people should have in the face of disaster.So, seeing the collapse of the World Trade Center today, we think that tomorrow, a greater building will be erected here. In the middle of the night, I went to the study next door to yours and unplugged the phone, hoping that the constant ringing would not wake you up from your sweet dreams. Of course, I'm not sure that your dreams must be good. I only hope that even if it's a dream, when you wake up, your parents will still be by your side.