I remember

I remember where I was 20 years ago today.

I remember watching the news, in horror.

14 women. Dead.

Because they were women.

I remember trying in vain for hours to reach a friend who was a student at L'Ecole Polytechnique.

I remember being grateful she wasn't an engineering student.

I remember being stunned. And baffled. And angry. And shocked. And scared.

It was the very first time in my life that I had witnessed that just being female could be enough to get you killed.

I grew up in a family of strong men. Sometimes loud men. But men who love, respect and cherish women. Men from my grandfather to my father to my uncles to my brother and to my cousins who all believed that there were no limits for the women in the family. We could do whatever and be whatever we wanted.

Until December 6, 1989 told me that there might be people who didn't share that view. It was the shattering of a dearly held illusion.

But most of all I remember the 14 women. We will never know what they could have brought to our country. What role they could have played in our national discourse on any level be it political, religious, scientific.

I remember them.

I remember.

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Here's a link to a powerful article by Stevie Cameron from today's G&M