Author: b.gunay

The other day I decided to visit the 9/11 memorial and museum and surprisingly it really was a fascinating experience. First of all, I decided to go there because the memorial is like 5 minutes from my house so I was like I might as well go and see. Before going to the museum I decided to go see the memorial and that was like on of the best decisions of my life. Seeing the memorial first I was really fascinated because it was so big and it looked fancy but after a few seconds I remembered the horrors that went down in this exact place and then I looked down the memorial and saw the hollow are. There I realized how many people have lost their lives here and it gave me goose bumps. It really was a memorial because it really made me remember what went down here and made me remember the horrific event that took the lives of many many people.

After seeing the memorial I decided to go to the 9/11 museum itself. At first I did not think it would be a big deal but after the moment I saw the firefighter helmets I got shivers down my spine. Seeing the helmets of the people who tried to save the lives of many and lost the lives of themselves in the process made me really see what happened here. It was something truly horrible. After walking more I saw a half destroyed firetruck and then saw the watch of a victim. It was truly horrifying but I really recommend people to go and see there so they can remember.

The last whole week was dedicated to suicide prevention at Baruch. My boi pierce hmu and said that it was interesting and we should go. I too thought it was interesting so I decided to go to the seminar they had. In the seminar there was a therapist and a counselor who worked outside of Baruch, there was also an army veteran that is going to Baruch, a counselor that works on campus and lastly the head of the psychology department was there.

One of the main things that we talked about was why people commit suicide and how we can prevent people from commuting suicide. We were told that we should always let someone know if we see a friend or not even a friend, anyone we know acting differently , not showing up to class or some sign of depression, we should just go talk to them. And we should be straight. We shall go and ask the person if he is going to commit suicide and even ask him how he is going to do it. This is really weird but that is what the head of the psychology department said so it probably has some truth to it. And of course we should always notify someone.

Another main thing that we talked about was that the term “kill yourself” also known as “kys” became too popular. The popularity of this term really affected the situation badly because someone may say “I want to kill myself” and then you would think it was a joke but what if it is not? Lastly we talked about how Baruch had a free counselor department that is ready to help anyone. We also talked about how we should not feel ashamed of saying that we see a therapist because you would not be ashamed to go to the doctor.

In the end this was a great experience for me and I am glad I attended the seminar.