From today’s NPR News Online:
For a brief moment, on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, Teresa Garcia thought she’d seen a ghost.
She was in her office in midtown Manhattan, watching the news of the attacks on the World Trade Center, when he walked in.
“He was covered with dust. All white dust. And we couldn’t even recognize him,” Garcia says, recalling that day. “But he talked to my coworker and he said ‘Esperanza.’ And she said, ‘Chino, is that you?’ “
Garcia works at Asociacion Tepeyac de New York, a non-profit that assists mostly Latino immigrants with English language skills, legal aid and tax assistance.
The man who walked in, Chino, was an undocumented immigrant. Garcia is using only nickname to protect his identity. He had been heading over to start his shift at a restaurant at one of the towers, when the first plane hit. In shock, he made his way to Asociacion Tepeyac, to see Garcia and her colleague Esperanza Chacon.
“He came over to her (Esperanza),” Garcias says, “and he embraced her, and they started crying.”
Little by little, dozens of workers started filing into Tepeyac’s offices, looking for comfort among friends. But what stood out were those who were missing, their friends who worked as cooks and cleaners, at or near the World Trade Center.
The workers who’d gathered at Tepeyac started compiling a list, which in the next few days grew to 700 missing people. Almost all immigrants, many undocumented.
That list was important. In order to get financial or medical aid, New Yorkers or their families had to prove they worked at or near ground zero and that they were affected by the attack. Knowing who was there also would allow families to mourn, to bring closure.
Read the complete story here.