I ’m a Metuchen High School graduate, back home after my freshman year studying at McGill University in Montreal, Canada.
When I’d mentioned the Boston Marathon bombing to fellow Canadian students, the general feeling amongst them was that such things happened only in the violent country to the south — they needn’t worry. (A similar sentiment was evident after the Newtown, Conn., shooting.)
I must admit that the assuredness was comforting, and I even started to adopt the same attitude, thinking at least I was in a safe country for the time being. It was hardly a week later, of course, that Canadian authorities announced the arrest of two alleged terrorists who were ready to sabotage the well-traveled passenger train connecting Toronto and New York, with the likelihood — had their plan been carried out — of hundreds of fatalities.
The news of the plot to be executed on Canadian soil was all it took for my peers, and myself, to sadly recognize that terrorism was an unavoidable global reality — a reality we all must live with.
Danisa Schiff
Metuchen