My household was a minor affair, we had little candles in the shape of the WTC on the dining room table. We would thank George Bush for the Patriot Act and then light the candles. We had to be good, because George Bush was always watching us with the Patriot Act, but if we were good, we'd get little pilot's wings pins.
The rich kids in my neighborhood had more elaborate plans. They had full on model WTC towers. If they were good, there would be RC planes under the towers on 9/11 morning. They were always showing me the cool videos when they destroyed the towers.
Growing up Jewish was hard. I'd see the beautiful 9/11 towers at my friends houses and then they'd come to my house and I'd have to explain what the six day war candles meant
We used to get natural towers every year, but in more recent years we just got a nice plastic set from home depot and store them in the attic.
As I mentioned in the other thread, we get a pair of 9/11 trees every year. The kids make paper people that they decorate and hang as ornaments. Then, on 9/11, we burn the trees down using thermite to symbolize the jet fuel that melted the steel beams.
My local pub had special commemorative drinks that game in a shot glass, layered red, white, and blue. You had to drink it pretty fast though or else it would turn into a brown sludge. Unfortunately it burned down and a couple of kids died.
The rich kids in my neighborhood had more elaborate plans. They had full on model WTC towers.
I always wanted the lego but those big sets were really expensive.
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The one American kid in the school would always talk about how good their big Thanksgiving dinners were or how elaborate their 9/11 towers were, etc etc.
He was bragging about how back home they had specially made towers that collapsed realistically. Like a classic upper class white family on 9/11 morning you see in movies.
The one time I went over to their house they had a framed photo of, get this, the kid lighting 2 (I assume alcohol or oil soaked) Jenga towers with a few sparklers bent to look like a plane.
My first expose to working class Americans lying and pretending to be richer than they are.
It's cool to hear how different cultures celebrate it. My family does WTC pinatas and 2 bats shaped like 747s. If you break them both in one swing, you get to cut the Iraq cake however you want (there's a little Saddam toy hiding in there that you get to keep it if it gets served your piece).
Every year we made paper mache WTC pinatas filled with candy and a special bat with wings glued to the sides and all the kids would take turns putting on a blindfold and shouting "Allahu Akbar!" as we took our swings. Great times, that's one memory I'll never forget.
A friend on Minecraft built the Twin Towers, one with a plane flying into it, into his city on our old RP world like a decade ago, lmao
we always make two gingerbread towers at the beginning of september. and then, when 9/11 comes around, we make the gingerbread planes
this year, in remembrance of the victims, we're having sour patch kids fall out of the windows
I had the best parents, they always made a big deal of this tradition when we were growing up.
I remember one 9/11 when we were kids, they built the cardboard towers in our living room, and wrapped them with firecrackers. Us kids got to light the firecrackers and there was a little 'pop' each time until the towers became structurally unsound and collapsed.
Then when the towers fell, us kids got to rip the wrapping paper off WTC7 and the other minor buildings to get the presents and sweets inside.
Beautiful childhood memories. The smell of firecrackers still brings me back :')
