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CNN Live Event/Special

People Come to St. Paul's Church to Remember 9/11

Aired September 11, 2002 - 14:50   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: And back to what we are marking here in the states, we have been reminded all day long, and sometimes pretty painful stretches, that the death toll on the World Trade Center attacks not just an abstract number. It represents nearly 3,000 people: husbands, wife, brothers, sisters, parents even a 2 1/2-year- old baby girl.
Maria is standing by at New York's Memorial Wall with the families who know firsthand the real meaning behind those awful numbers.

Maria, good afternoon.

MARIA HINOJOSA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Paula. This is an extraordinary scene here. We are one block away from ground zero.

On the other side of the street there, life is going on as we have been told, it must go on. There are buses, traffic, people going to lunch, people shopping, people who are working.

On the other hand, you have got an extraordinary number of people who have come to St. Paul's Church which became the center for all of the workers who were working at ground zero. The church, built in 1766, not one window broken.

You also have people who have come down here to make statements. These women are saying no to war. They have come to pay their respects but wanted to communicate their message. They say that they have been well received most of all, mostly here at ground zero.

And then this group of New Yorkers, kind of a typical scene. We've got -- your name is...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Sarah (ph).

HINOJOSA: Sarah Goodman (ph). You a New Yorker. You came down here because...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I came here because soon after 9/11 I felt that New Yorkers came together. There was a real sense of community and it was sort of what I have always dreamed about, the way people could cut through the alienation of what a city sometimes is and there's with a lot of people in Union Square an there was a lot of discussion, not only about our feelings, but about how we felt.

HINOJOSA: Have you felt, today, that what we felt as New Yorkers right after 9/11, that it's come back, you can look into each other's eye and feel this warmth?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I felt a little bit of it. I can't say that I felt as the same way it was. I feel like we haven't quite been given the opportunity because, you know, we all have to still, for most people, go to work today and there is not the space that there was, and maybe people don't want to dredge up their feelings.

But I would like it to be back. I felt people were engaging in discussions, too, about things then world that usually don't get talked about, don't get looked at.

HINOJOSA: Thank you. You know what? I can tell you that at least riding down on the subway today, there was that sense of looking at each other, feeling that warmth once again amongst New Yorkers, extraordinary -- Aaron.

AARON BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Maria, thank you.

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