What were your surroundings when you first heard about the destruction of the twin towers?

“I was in my 20s, and I was working at the University of Missouri as a teacher assistant, so basically I taught French classes levels one and two. It was a day I had two classes, and I remember going to my morning class where I was teaching, and the students knew before I knew what had happened. They came in very distraught and very upset asking if I knew what had happened. So, I asked what happened, and I thought it would just be some gossip about something that happened at the University. Then we started watching some video footage they had on their phones and [reading] some newspaper articles. It was really just a big sickening and disheartening feeling. As the day progressed we got more and more information and the students were not able to concentrate or learn. So, for the rest of the day we just tried to talk about the events that were happening (of course including some French when we could) but mostly talking about how we were feeling about it and what was actually happening. We tried to focus on facts. No one came to the afternoon class because everyone was just dealing with the events that were happening in the United States at the time.”

What was your reaction?

“Pretty much I was in disbelief and utter shock. It just made me physically ill to see the video footage. The more you found out, the worse you felt about it.”