It’s the morning of October 12 here in Australia and New Zealand. A year ago today, a small band of religious nutjobs decided it would be a good idea to detonate a bomb outside a nightclub in Bali, and kill 202 people, mostly young, carefree backpackers with most of their lives yet to be lived.
My little nation of 20 million people lost 88 souls in the terrible explosion and fire. New Zealand also lost some of her young citizens, and many other nations were also represented, and shared our loss.
The culprits have been rounded up, and two of them have been sentenced to death. As an opponent of the death penalty, now I’m not sure how I feel, especially at the thought of the image of an unrepentant Amrozi smugly grinning at the cameras in the coutroom. Well sorry mate, you ain’t going to get your 88 virgins where you are going.
Thank you for starting this thread. I thought of starting one myself but wasn’t sure I had the right words for it (and of course, it’s still October 11th over here).
It’s funny – my grandmother lives down the street from the Pentagon and my father worked there for years when I was growing up, but in some ways the Bali bombing hit me harder. If someone I knew had worked in the World Trade Center or the Pentagon, I would have known it – or at least found out sooner or later. But there had been so many Australian backpackers with whom I’d shared a casual drink or conversation. Most of the time we’d never exchanged last names, sometimes not even first names. In the first days after the bombing, I found myself wondering what happened to Kit, who educated me about the ways of London pubs, or Kylie who had the bunk above mine in York, or the two Kiwi guys who invited me to a a party at their place. I don’t know whether I knew any of the victims; I will probably never know.
Perhaps the biggest change in my life over the last couple of years has been the way traveling has become less casual and more sobering. I try to exchange last names and addresses with the people I meet now.
Condolences to any Dopers who have lost friends or family members.
My condolences to Australians, New Zealanders, and Indonesians who may be reading this. I typed and deleted a lot of things just now, trying to say something appropriate. But I don’t know if there is anything appropriate. I am so sad our countries have lost good people. I hope some day things will be better.
Thoughts from New Zealand, this day, to all my fellow New Zealanders, to the Australians, to the Indonesians, and other nationalities caught up in the continuing grief and other effects from this tragedy.
I’d just like to add (as I didn’t make it clear in my OP) that Indonesia herself lost thirty-eight of her people in this tragedy. Beyond that, the economic damage to Bali is something the decent people of that island will have to live with for a long, long time. Tourism is a major industry in that part of the world, and it puts food on the table for a lot of families.
Condolences from New York. The randomness of it is the worst to me. The bombers didn’t care if the victims were Muslim, Balinese, how they felt about the Middle East situation, what kind of people they were…
I said an extra prayer for them today at church. Yes, also in the name of religion.
Some twisted people thrive on destruction and chaos. As with 9/11, my thoughts and prayers go out to the families of the victims.
As for opposing the death penalty, whatever you might feel, one thing is for certain; the SOBs that carried this out will neve hurt anyone again, and that’s good enough for me.
My condolences. A fair share of those who died were living in HK, most of them members of the Hong Kong Football Club. They were mourned all over HK last night.
I didn’t want to post on the anniversary of the devastation of Bali, because I thought that this thread would have been absolutely inundated with posts of support and concern from Dopers all around the globe.
Seems as though I was mistaken.
Eleven responses to remember the 202 people who died in the Bali Bombings?
Colour me embittered by the lack of concern. Unless the ‘tragedy’ happens in the USA, it is of no importance…is that how it goes??
Thankyou though to all who did post in this thread.
Cheers.
:rolleyes:
This isn’t GD, so MEBuckner’s sticky about the importance of descriptive thread titles isn’t sitting up top here.
If the thread title had been, “The Bali Bombings 10/12/02 - Australia’s September 11” I have no doubt this thread would be three or four pages long by now.
But “October 12” has no resonance to most of us, except perhaps as Columbus Day. So despite the “Australia’s September 11” part, I suspect most posters look at the thread title, say “WTF??” and don’t even open this one to find out what it’s about. And it’s silly to criticize people for not posting to a memorial thread about the Bali bombings, if they didn’t know it was about the Bali bombings.
I feel a bit guilty over not realizing how much of an impact the bombing had on Dopers from that corner of the world. Kambuckta does have a point. We are a bit jaded in the States. We read about an atrocity somewhere in the world in the papers almost every day. Lately, we can’t even read the paper without hearing about a U.S. citizen being killed in Iraq. I have to admit that other than the number of victims being higher than usual, I wasn’t as affected as I should have been. I’m sorry that you’ve joined us in being victims of these maniacs and hope that the families of the victims can find peace.
Kam mate, you have a point, but I think the blame lies with America, not the average American. If the Australian media thinks Aussies are dumb, the American media has an even lower opinion of its own domestic consumer base.
Americans, it seems, don’t always have access to a great deal of international news. Sure it’s there, and we have a bunch of intelligent folk on these boards who do have a reasonably good handle on things, but nonetheless I don’t blame the US posters for this thread’s poor showing. I blame the likes of CNN.
Let’s not bicker, guys. It’s a tragedy when one innocent person dies, regardless of cause or location.
My condolences to all affected by this tragedy.
an aside to kam: I didn’t even see this thread till today. Sometimes timing is a bitch.
TLD, rest asuured that this average American does indeed care. I was deeply affected by April 19th, 1995, for many different reasons. One of them being I live in Oklahoma City. So, seeing the Bali Bombing news mad me immensely sad. Would I have been so attuned to it if not for April 19th? I honestly don’t know.
I have opened this thread several times to respond, but my anxiety level soars and words fail me. So I’ll simply give my love and condolences to all and my wish that we all can find a place of peace and serenity.
Must it be an anniversary to remember those lost? How has humanity, society evolved into this conveyor-belt mentality? “X year(s) ago this happened today, so we remember those lost today. Tomorrow we go back to normal, without a thought towards them?”
When there is no more tragedy, that should be accepted. But for now, it should always be in the back of your mind. They aren’t martyrs, they did not die for a cause. They died completely needlessly, going about their own business. Having fun.
Should that not be just a trace of a thought as we do the same things, that which they will never get to do again?