AVIYA KUSHNER
419
"BIN LADEN IS A GENIUS," the medieval charity researcher mutters to
me as we retrieve our suitcases from the thousands of pieces of luggage
thrown on Heathrow's floor. One of my suitcases has been pried open,
my clothes strewn on the floor. After a brief check with security-a tam–
pered suitcase, we're nervous-we passengers prepare to carry our lug–
gage all the way across the interminable passageways of Heathrow.
I was stranded in London for six days, unable to call my family in
New York, not knowing whether my siblings were alive. I knew one of
my brothers was in New York City on the morning of the
I
nh, another
in Washington, D.C. The only thing that helped, oddly enough, was a
movie. My friend in London forced me to leave the apartment and the
television to go see
Moulin Rouge.
During the credits, I noticed names
from every possible nationality-Irish names, Italian names, Jewish
names, Greek names, Chinese names, all of America and all of its immi–
grant groups-coming together in those credits. That, there, all those
names, I thought as I cried, that's the open-armed country I was born in.
I could understand the poignancy of immigration to freer lands. The
whole hopeful history of America is something I grew up with, some–
thing I could understand when Ella Nelimov talked of leaving the cold
Ural Mountains for the heat and democracy of Tel Aviv.
I kept seeing Ella's face as I watched the BBC broadcast the collaps–
ing World Trade Center. It's not just the terror attack, I thought. It's
what comes after.
Every bomb reminds us of something. We remember how much we
love, who we love, what we'd say if we only had one sentence left to say,
how lucky we are to have our lives in the first place. We're reminded
whether or not the bomb goes off, whether it kills or doesn't kill,
whether the perpetrator is caught or whether he's still running loose.
The Dolphinarium bombing reminded Israel of all the things such
tragedy always reminds us of: the awfulness of dead high-school stu–
dents, of mourning children, and of democracy's essential truth-that
the people who come to it are often what keep it alive. The immigrants
are the hope.
EVERY BOMB IS PERSONAL. Each is so sudden. For the first minute, it's
just you and the news. Then it's you, the news, and the person sitting or
standing next to you at that nanosecond. In Israel, every bomb is fol–
lowed by a flurry of cell-phone calls. "Are you all right?" each caller
asks. We all have that person we call first, and every bomb solidifies
that. We all want to hear that person pick up.
