After attack, Charlotte native in Paris tries to make sense of violence

Editor’s note: The author is a Charlotte native who graduated from Myers Park High School in 2013. The Northwestern University junior, who interned at the Observer over the past two summers, is studying at Sciences Po in Paris for the fall semester.

I set out for the Stade de France on Friday evening with my friend Norma, excited to see a football game. We got our cheeks painted with the French flag at the stadium, drank beer and cheered in French with the rest of the crowd. It was a fun and familiar game all the way through, except for two huge noises in the first half that made us both pause. We didn’t find out until the game ended that we had heard the suicide bombers attacking a bar next to the stadium.

I checked my phone as we stood up to leave and saw a few messages from family asking, “Are you okay??” Scrolling down, I saw the news alert: Several shootings were happening in Paris and bombs had gone off near the Stade de France.

Norma and I had an incredulous moment of realizing we were at the spot of one of the attacks. I messaged when I could that I was OK, still wondering if I really was yet. We decided to try to find a cab home instead of taking the metro, which seemed like an easy target for another attack.

Though startled, the reality of the situation didn’t really set in until we walked out of the stadium and saw the crowds. At the end of the game, an announcer had told attendees that several exits were closed without an explanation. It seemed some people had checked their phones like we did at the end of the game, but people were finding out at different times.

As we were confronted with the scene before us, I suddenly saw a huge rush of people running in our direction. Norma thought she heard someone say, “There’s someone here,” like there might be more shooters or bombers. With the crowd, we immediately turned and sprinted back into a lower level of the stadium, trying to get as far back into the building as possible. I learned later that there wasn’t another shooter or bomber, just a panicked crowd when police closed off a new area. Other people had run back onto the field inside the stadium.

That’s when the situation began to feel really scary. We strategized. We needed to get home, but was the metro safe enough? Could we even find a cab here? Was it safer to wait at the stadium or more dangerous, since it seemed like an obvious target? Was anywhere really safe, considering the other attacks rolling in?

We eventually decided to take a chance on the metro, which was already outfitted with police and a bomb-sniffing dog. We sat in silence on the way back along with many other people coming from the stadium.

Normally on the metro, no one looks at each other. But we spent the ride exchanging somber looks with the other passengers. I watched a couple holding hands and a family with two small boys, both tense like the rest of us. I listened to some people nervously joking and others checking the news.

I eventually made it back, as did Norma. I started checking in with family and friends who were checking on me – and with friends I have here whom I hadn’t heard from yet. Many of my friends in Paris were stuck where they had been when the attacks happened, in restaurants and at friends’ apartments. I was incredibly lucky, as it looks like all of my friends are accounted for and safe.

I didn’t go to sleep until 3:30 a.m. after pouring through news updates. I spent most of Saturday doing the same thing – trying to make sense of this violence.

Usually I feel desensitized to news about terrorism or war or natural disasters or death. It’s hard for me to empathize with people I don’t know when I see a death toll. Friday night brought me much closer to understanding what other people have gone through and live through on a daily basis. Some of the most poignant images to me Friday night were the reactions of the children. Some had been picked up and carried as their parents ran back inside the stadium. Many walked around crying and confused, holding onto a parent and not understanding what was happening.

While the whole night was scary for me, I wasn’t at the bombing or a shooting. Many people’s everyday reality is living through that terror and the possibility of losing their loved ones. And terror attacks that haven’t happened in Paris, on the same scale, don’t begin to get the same amount of coverage and concern. When I hear about a suicide bomber somewhere in the Middle East, it usually goes over my head. Now I will pay more attention and try to mourn equally for the people who live this regularly.

It’s important as well to keep these acts from inspiring hatred. It seems that after every terrorist attack, there is a new wave of Islamophobia. Muslims are not to blame and neither are the refugees coming into Europe right now, who are fleeing from what we just experienced last night.

I’m left, with many of my friends here, still trying to understand the unnecessary violence of Friday night. We have adopted this beautiful city as our own and never during my time here have I felt closer to and more appreciative of Paris and her people. I imagine it’s similar to what some New Yorkers and Americans felt after 9/11 . While shopping for groceries Saturday I saw many people with dark circles under their eyes, many people outside their shops making phone calls, many people greeting each other with a special affection when arriving to work. The city is grieving.

We’re still stuck for the most part in our homes, but with every day things will go back to normal. I plan on going to donate blood at a hospital when I can get to one. In the next few days I will be reconnecting with the people I love here, sharing our experiences and support.

I deeply thank everyone who has reached out to me on any level. The sadness and confusion of the violence has been tempered by the love I have felt from friends at home and abroad.

Mon coeur reste avec Paris.

This story was originally published November 15, 2015 at 3:16 PM with the headline "After attack, Charlotte native in Paris tries to make sense of violence."