email165.xml

email165.xml

born-digital

email

unknown

yes

2002-04-25

Susan: Thank you for your message. I've been having a terrible time getting onto the internet. I found a cafe closer to where I live but everytime I head over there either the connection is down or there are too many people waiting in line. My family is fine. Pasha and Linda were on their way to vote after dropping to kids off at school and saw the first plane hit the WTC. They hurried back to get the kids when the second plane hit. They got home and stayed there until last Thursday (within the zone but they had electricity and phone service unlike many others.) Last Thursday, Linda and the children walked to 14th and then took the subway to Grand Central. Unfortunately, as they were sitting on the train there was a bomb scare and they were evacuated. They walked to Pasha's office (yes, in mid-town) and were waiting there when the skyscraper next door was evacuated because of a bomb scare. Pasha sent them to Westport in a dial car. Linda and the kids were very upset by the time they got to parents. Daniel is scared of planes and Rachel doesn't want to hear any talk about the situation. I think after five days with my parents they were better. Another family also came and stayed at my parents from the neighborhood. Below is an email from my mother giving the latest report to the family. I thought you might be interested. Of course, my family is very concerned about the reaction to Muslims and Arab Americas. Pasha spoke at a service that the firm held about the issue in particular. They are also very concerned about the community and the school. I think having something to do is helpful. Pasha and Daniel watched as No.7 came down. They kept going out to check the wind direction and the fires. Pasha told me that it was amazing to watch fire engines and rescue vehicles from all other come down there street. Their street was the volunteers staging area. I am worried that I will be logged off so I am sending this now before something happens. I am fine here in Beijing. Studying, studying, studying!! More news soon. Take care. Kamala

First a report on the state of things in New York. Daniel and Rachel went back to school in P.S. 41, on 11th street, on Thursday. It is

squeezing two schools into one building, and all three fifth grades, for
instance, at P.S. 234 were squeezed into one room - 96 students,
slightly less than that, because not all students were there, but
surprisingly, almost all the students in the school were there. But that
many students in one room, even with three teachers, is more than a bit
of a problem. At the end of the day Daniel said it was chaos. The second
day was better. And Rachel came home with a new friend, an Israeli
girl...
They don't have desks, so Linda and Pasha were working on getting
donations of rug remnants so they would have something other than the
floor to sit on. Three rugs, says Daniel. Pasha has already talked
Compaq, think it was, into giving them computers. And he has called the
planetarium - the head went to Harvard with him - to arrange for a trip
there. Ditto the Metropolitican Museum of Art. He talked to me about
arranging a trip to the UN, but the UN is under tight security. I can't
get in, so...So P.S. 234 does have a good many parents who are
determined to make the best of this, with contacts that will help.
P.S.234 is being used by the police, etc., but the electricity is back.
It needs a good cleaning. It is just beyond the zone where people can
go. The Parent Association is pushing to get it turned back into being a
school quickly. Linda's park is open in the daytime, but not at night.
And there is a worry about asbestos pieces in the sand boc. The school
is on the other side of Chambers St., so off limits so far.
Pasha walked yesterday from the tip of Manhattan to North Moore Street
where they live on Broadway. That is the dividing line, running north
south, that divides the lower part of Manhattan into east and west.
Chambers St. is the northern boundary, for everything west of Chambers,
and Rector St. is the southern boundary. So the stock exchange on the
eastern side is open and the Wall St. area around it, in fact the whole
eastern section. Below Rector stree, on the western side on NY, is also
opn. But everything between Chambers and Rector, on the western side of
Broadway, remains closed. And a lot of people live there, including one
family we housed in Westport. They are now living in a hotel.
We were there last night. My brother Witter was visiting. We could take
the subway to Franklin St. It is now the last stop on the subway. All
the stops below will be out of commission for years. The tunnels for the
subway in the area where the World Trade Center have collapsed. So the
local that used to go to South Ferry is out, rather Franklin is the last
stop. But now it is routed to go to Brooklyn through a subway tunnel on
the east side of lower Manhattan. It will take a long time to rebuild.
Even last night the debris was burning, and there was a huge black plume
of smoke, which when the wind is blowing in your direction brings an
acrid smell. And the traffic is fire dept, police dept., Verizon working
24 hours a day to put in lines for electricity, etc. And the removal of
debris will go on for weeks or months.
On the other hand, Bubby's, the restaurant on the corner of North Moore,
was back in operation and we had dinner there. Food Emporium is back in
business. And many other stores, etc., are open again.
Pasha has been very involved in organizing the lawyers of NY to give
legal help to any of the small businesses who need it. Many of them are
certainly going to be unable to pay their staff, make payments on loans,
etc. And undoubtedly banks will not demand payments...
And both he and Linda have been working on the school. There was a
meeting of the principal with the parents Friday morning, followed by a
meeting with a counselor whom they said was excellent.
I, of course, have been thinking of the legal, multilateral options that
the US should use, not the use of military power. But that is a huge
topic. Most people don't seem to know that both the UN Security Council
and the General Assembly have passed resolutions. Read a lousey column
in the NY Post yesterday that was blaming the UN, seed bed of
terrorists. And CNN. Ugh.
Anyway, everyone is doing OK, they are all energized, but it will be a
long time before the southern part of NY will stop looking like a war
zone. Amazingly, we all have good words to say about Mayor Guiliani,
whom none of us much liked. Almost destroyed himself with his domestic
quarrel. But he said and did the right things, including words, long
before Bush, about not blaming Arab Americans...
Ann
>From: "Susan Breslin"
>To: "Kamala Lakhdhir"
>Subject: Islam
>Date: Sat, 15 Sep 2001 08:46:53 -0400
>
Kamala -- Molly's message is now zinging around the US, and I think may be a little helpful. There is a lot of very bad anti-Arab sentiment here, and a fair number of acts of violence, mostly nationally, but a Sikh was very badly beaten in Queens, and there are extra police patrols in Arab areas and outside mosques.

You might be interested to hear that one of the standard talk-show Arabists (can't remember his name, but he is a scholar somewhere) was on Nightline last night and read a long fatwa issued by the top religious authority in Saudi Arabia, condemning the attack in specific terms about the ways it violated tenets of Islam and labelling those who commit such acts as enemies of Islam. It doesn't seem to have gotten any play. If you can get your sources to get it into e-mail circulation labelled by a credible source (such as the US Embassy in Riyadh).

I looked up Pasha in the phone book and found to my relief that he works in midtown. However, I'm sure it was traumatic for them on many levels nonetheless, and schools below Canal are still not open.

When you have a chance, since you've found a cybercafe, let me know how you're doing.

9/23/2001

Message from KSL