“Perhaps they are not stars, but rather openings in heaven where the love of our lost ones pours through and shines down upon us to let us know they are happy.”
– Eskimo proverb

In memoriam

Joe Nguyen, AsiaXpress.com

April 18, 2007

Not again.

As a 15-year-old sophomore in high school, I remember watching the events of Columbine unfold on television during math class on April 20, 1999. I didn’t know what to make of it. It seemed surreal. It appeared to be something out of fiction, not reality.

At the time I didn’t feel sad nor did I feel fear. The overwhelming sensation was confusion. I couldn’t comprehend why this was happening.

It’s now almost eight years later to the day. There have been numerous school shootings since, but none to the magnitude of that on April 16.

Thirty-three.

Thirty-three lives lost in a senseless act of violence and the confusion has returned.

I’ve been asking myself what 23-year-old Seung-Hui Cho was thinking when he took the lives of students and faculty members April 16 at the Virginia Tech campus.

The Associated Press reported that Cho constructed an eight-page rant against rich kids and religion before executing this massacre. NBC has shown footage from the videotape he made.

“You had a hundred billion chances and ways to have avoided today," Cho says eerily on the video. "But you decided to spill my blood. You forced me into a corner and gave me only one option. The decision was yours. Now you have blood on your hands that will never wash off."

Clearly this is the ranting of a mad man.

There will be time to figure out why Cho decided to do what he did.

There will be time to figure out if this could have been prevented.

There will be time to ask why the media spent so much time focusing on how he was an immigrant from Korea, despite the fact that he had lived in the U.S. since he was eight.

There will be time to point fingers and spread the blame.

But now is the time to mourn. Now is the time to reflect. The memories of the deceased individuals must not fade away as quickly as their lives did.

We never truly understand the preciousness of life until it is taken away.

For more on the victims, visit The New York Times' online memorial: http://www.nytimes.com/ref/us/20070418_VICTIMS_GRAPHIC.html.

Joe Nguyen is the editor in chief for AsiaXpress.com. Joe can be reached at joe@asiaxpress.com.