By Mary Williams
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
Tension and uneasiness consumed the streets of downtown Los
Angeles Tuesday, replacing business and politics as the rulers of
the city.
A few people stood at the side of the road ““ refugees of
the highly coordinated terrorist attack across the country that
damaged the Pentagon and destroyed the World Trade Center.
In front of the Arco Plaza, two businessmen from New York were
left with nothing to do and no way to get home. All flights were
cancelled and the business they had come to conduct was postponed
when the building was evacuated.
Looking at the two Arco towers, one of the men laughed
nervously.
He noted that even stacked on top of one another, they were not
as tall as the World Trade Center, the first target of
Tuesday’s attack.
“You can imagine how many people died,” he said.
As the men waited, police motorcycles regularly drove past in
pairs and U.S. marshals stood guard outside nearby federal
buildings.
Elsewhere the atmosphere was less tense.
Instead of offices emptied of their professionals, there were
shops, many open for business as usual. Pedestrians walked past,
but didn’t enter the stores.
“People aren’t in the city … People are in
mourning about the losses that have happened,” said George
Mobasseri, who works for Modo Broadway, one of the stores that
planned on closing its doors a few hours earlier than usual.
At a McDonald’s a few blocks from the skyscrapers of
downtown, Mark Simpson sat shaking his head as he ate, still
shocked by the news he had heard hours before.
“It doesn’t make sense,” he repeated.
“Thousands of people died.”
Through the restaurant’s windows, life appeared to
continue.
“I think it shows character. We don’t want to show
terrorists that this whole country has shut down,” said Teddy
Kang, who was in the city on business. “To say that
we’re working doesn’t show that we’re not
concerned … It shows a kind of strength of this country, and the
people, too.”
With reports from Shauna Mecartea, Daily Bruin Senior Staff.