Terror strikes my hometown and neighborhood - AGAIN

PARIS

My second city's tribute to my
hometown

To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, for a global city to be hit by a terror attack once a year can be considered a misfortune; to be hit twice smacks of gross negligence. Add to that that my neighborhood is the only one with the dubious honor of having been targeted twice makes me wonder if time hasn't come for me to move permanently to my second home, Rio de Janeiro. Now, that would be the mother of all ironies: seeking refuge from terror in a city well-known for random violence.

But we live in troubled times where what made sense for so long suddenly doesn't. Here is a short summary of the last 48 hours.

As (bad) luck would have it, as in the dreadful events last January (which I recounted in this post ) I was at home on Friday evening, relaxing from a long week of SAP-to-Workday workshops at French pharma giant Sanofi, when I heard the ear-splitting sound of sirens. At the beginning I didn't pay much attention, but after a while it suddenly hit me that the blaring sirens had been going at it for a good fifteen minutes. A quick look at the city skyline didn't reveal any Neronian fire. An accident, maybe? Then the ominous alternative crept into my mind: another attack?

I grabbed the TV remote control and tuned into one of the 24-hour French channels. My hunch was confirmed: another series of terror attacks have hit my hometown with my neighborhood once again targeted.(Dear Mr. Terrorist, I don't mind your being bloodthirsty. But do you also have to be unfair? Would you mind spreading the victim share among all Paris districts? Next time, could you try Montorgueuil?  Or the 16th arrondissement? Why not cross the Seine and have fun in the Left Bank?)

Since the action was taking place just a few blocks away from my place, I grabbed my coat and ran out. It was around 11 pm. By then I had already received some text/Whatsapp messages from friends and family who, when apprised of my intention to go to the Bataclan concert hall, tried to dissuade me. But there was no way I was going to experience the events vicariously on a small screen when I could witness them live.

The next few hours will probably never be erased from my memory. In the cold fall night I stood and watched as the elite security squads forced their way in using their guns in deafening noise, soon to be followed by explosions as the terrorists blew themselves up. Then the sad sight of bodies being retrieved. My phone battery died but I managed to shoot (no pun intended) a couple of videos and take some pictures. I'll never forget the distraught young man whose two brothers were inside the Bataclan (where I had been many times for some popular parties) and who tried to go in but was restrained by the cops (I later heard they had both died).

Few people managed to sleep that night in the neighborhood, or in the city. The next morning I woke up early and went back to see the remains of the carnage: the sad pair of shoes of a concert goer who never suspected that his Friday fun would put an end to his life. Still-fresh blood on the pavement was a reminder of the horror that took place just a few hours ago.

Apologies for the gory details but sometimes you need to
face reality head-on

People were too shocked to engage in meaningful and rational discourse. But some questions were being asked and the government's official version challenged:

- Some claimed that many who died didn't die at the hands of the attackers but as side effect of the police action - collateral damage, they'd call it in the US (but the supine press won't tell you about it.)
- Also, how come that for the second time in a year, and even more spectacularly, terrorists were allowed to operate freely in France?
-Was this timed for the the looming key regional election where the incompetent government headed by the Clown-in-Chief; François Hollande, is expected to suffer a big defeat? (I watched him on TV and his incompetence was eerily reminiscent of Gerge W. Bush as captured in Fahrenheit 9/11: both "leaders" showing they were not up to the task)
- Should France continue to target IS (Islamic State - not Information Systems) in Syria, if IS can retaliate so easily and spectacularly in France?

A victim's scattered sad belongings:
A testimony to the horror  that took place a couple of hours ago

The media vultures were all over the place and I was flabbergasted to see their reporters interviewing basically anybody who walked up to them and served them any cock-and-bull story. A Spanish anchorwoman basically bought lock, stock and barrel what was clearly the rants of an old woman who kept on referring to the Second World War. Other reporters fed their audience the asinine comments that all of us will later lap up while watching TV. A wise neighbor told me, "The only group who knows less than reporters is the government: and the little they know, they are not telling us." Couldn't disagree with him, since the entire French political class has lost the last shreds of respect from the citizenry. They can't fix the environment, but spend billions organizing a useless COP21 jamboree whose only function is to serve as a political marketing ploy for the government (regional elections were undemocratically pushed back to help the moron masquerading as French president win a few votes with the event's reflected glory). They can't fix the economy, nor unemployment now at record levels, and even less immigration. At least we thought they could keep us safe but, as this year's events are proving, the political class is also proving to be an abject failure at security. So, why are we putting up with them much longer? Shouldn't such low performers have been discarded long ago? Beats me.

In moments like these, scared people give the impression of rallying behind the "leader" who has no idea in what direction to lead us. But deep down inside of them, most know it is hopeless.

Last night, I took the metro around 10 pm and was deeply shocked to find it empty. I was born here and have never seen an empty metro on a Saturday night. The streets were equally empty, reminding me of that Friday in the early 90s when I was living in New York City and we were told at noon to go home because of the fear the Rodney King riots from Los Angeles would spill over in Manhattan. Last night in Paris I was eerily reminded of that distant Friday when I walked from the UN building towards Grand Central Station and the greatest city on earth was deserted in anticipation of possible mayhem. But in ghost-town Paris disaster had already struck. And will strike again. No solution is in sight.

Poor Paris.

Poor France.

(Except for the Christ the Redeemer picture, all photos and videos by the blogger)

UPDATE: Nov. 26, 2015. A week ago, while browsing through press accounts I stumbled on the name of a victim ("Djamila Houd") and her place of origin (Dreux, South west of Paris). I immediately emailed Tassadit Houd, one of my oldest friends, who is from Dreux, asking her whether she was a relative. I was getting worried when I couldn't get through to Tassadit and today I finally heard from her: Djamila was indeed a relative. Her own sister! She and her family are devastated. It took them 10 days before they got to bury her. Djamila was having a quiet dinner at the sidewalk restaurant La Belle Equipe (belonging to her husband, Gregory) when she was shot twice in the back. Here's the account by the local paper. In the family picture at the funeral my friend Claire Tassadit is the second from the right. Another press report quotes my dear friend Tassadit's tribute to her sister.

IN MEMORIAM
Djamila Houd, a Muslim victim of Islamist terrorists.
She leaves behind a husband and an 8-year-old girl who
will become a "Ward of the Nation"

Terror in Paris, on my doorstep - literally

PARIS

            Mayhem right on the blogger's doorstep.

The ambulance pictured on the left blocks the

way to the blogger's home. On the right-hand side is the
street where took place the worst massacre France
has  know in over 50 years,

The day started quite oddly with so much mist and haze that Notre-Dame Cathedral was hidden behind an unusual wall of pea soup. Little did I suspect that the day would end with the famous cathedral tolling its bell.

Alone the whole day and working from home (one of the perks of being a freelancer  -except when you're on the road), I was so busy dealing with several things that I when I heard the loud bangs around 11:30 am I didn't pay much attention to them. After all central Paris, like all large metropolises, is so full of different types of noises that they barely register with you. I just thought, "Oh, I'm late, I should have gone out quickly to get some lunch."

It was over lunch (which I had at home, too busy to go out) that I heard the dreadful news. A terror attack had resulted in 12 deaths at a well-known French satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo, famous for the caricatures that drew the ire of radical Islamists. I knew vaguely that the magazine had its offices 10 minutes' walk from my place, although subconsciously, I also remembered that after being threatened they had moved somewhere else.

The entrance to the blogger's building. On the right you can see
where one of the shots fired by the killers went

The blogger taking a picture of the bullet
that went into a window right by the entrance
to his building a few minutes before he was due out.
Behind the blogger, heavy police presence guarding
Charlie Hebdo's offices

After an early afternoon conference call with a client, I went out to run some errands quickly before coming back for another meeting when, upon coming out of my building, I felt as if I had just stumbled upon a film set. Ambulances, TV crews, cops: pandemonium everywhere.  A neighbor mumbled something about "suspects" and I thought, "Oh, one of the killers must have tried to hide in the vicinity." I felt the cops were being a bit paranoid, though, since I had to show my ID to leave the cordoned off area and come back.  I asked one of the cops what the matter was, and his reply was a curt, "Just watch BFM" (a popular French TV station).

As soon as I came back home I turned the TV on to get more info and see what was the link between the massacre and my street. I flipped through several channels, and suddenly I felt something was not right. There was something weird about some of the pictures. They looked eerily familiar. I immediately hit the internet where I checked some pictures. And, then, my neurons connected. And I was shocked by the realization that...

...the murders had taken place on my doorstep! Literally.  I then remembered that about a year ago the street right across the entrance to my building had started getting the presence of a police car. I had asked around why, whether some VIP had moved in, but nobody I talked to knew. And every time I walk by, which is basically every day I'm in Paris, I see the police car and always make a mental note to find out who they are protecting.

Now I know. This is where Charlie Hebdo had moved. And without any publicity since there was no sign indicating their presence. That didn't prevent the killers from not only finding the location of the new office, but also picking the one day in the month  where all the main reporters gather around the editor.

The killers shot their assault rifles inside and outside the Charlie
Hebdo office. On the streets they hit the blogger's building

Another thought hit me. 11:30 was the time when I had planned to go out but I was busy on a call that I had decided to go out later. I can only imagine what could have happened if I had crossed paths with the murderers. So easy to die of a stray bullet; I survived one in Rio de Janeiro, a couple of years ago (it flew two inches from my face), so I am probably down to only five lives now.

I immediately headed back downstairs just on time to see the French president with several of his Cabinet members walk by to pay their respects to the victims. To enter my building I had to walk around the large ambulance parked right in front of the entrance door: it had been used to ferry the dead and the injured.

Car parked right by the entrance door to my building which was
hit by the killers' car as they escaped - or came in. Some details
are still unclear. But the police forensics spent several hours
analyzing it in detail and scooping up all the evidence around

That's when I heard that among the dead were Wolinski and Cabu. Wolinski has been famous since my teen years for his comic strips, and Cabu was a talented cartoonist whom we hired at PeopleSoft in 2000 for the launch of Release 8.0. He entertained us through his quick-witted drawings during Craig Conway's presentation. The then CEO of PeopleSoft couldn't understand why throughout his presentation there were moments of undiluted audience hilarity until he'd turn around and look at the screen and catch, between his slides, a funny Cabu cartoon making a spot-on comment on the wonderful world of business software.

The day after at noon: one minute silence in front of the
Charlie Hebdo office. The blogger's building stands
behind the mourners

The rest of the day was of course lost to work as the neighborhood, family and friends, and the whole nation gathered to mourn the massacre France has thought will never happen.

Notre Dame Cathedral, here seen from the blogger's home,
 at midnight, as it begins to toll its bell for the day's victims.

A day to remember. And wonder if worse is to come. And some serious thinking about the implications of the event will have to made by political leaders.

(All pictures taken by the blogger. Free use allowed)