Mariana van Zeller

I was so happy.

I was like, oh my God, I did it.

I did it.

I have a future in this profession that I really want to be a journalist, and this is great.

And then I will never forget, and I get emotional every time I talk about this, but I will never forget just walking down to the streets and

it's every time I talk about this, but in seeing the first people looking for their loved ones, right?

And it's like the posters with the faces of the husbands and the children and not knowing where they were.

And that moment totally changed my life because, sorry.

It was a moment that, yeah, first of all, realization like, what the fuck?

This is not about you.

And this is about something so much bigger that's happening where so many people are affected by this.

And it was the moment also that I realized that the kind of journalism that I wanted to do was try to understand why this sort of evil happens in the world and how do things like this exist.

And a year after I graduated from Columbia, I moved to the Middle East.

And I enrolled in the University of Damascus in Syria to learn Arabic and to try to –

um, do my, I did my first story as a freelance journalist about the jihadis who were crossing to Iraq to fight against the Americans.

That was the first story I ever did as a freelance journalist.

And, uh, and so, yeah, so I was, I was there on 9-11 and, uh, um, remember after reporting and going, you know, to school and going up to my building and,

meeting strangers on the streets and everybody was just like looking at each other and hugging each other.

And there was like so much love and support.

And it lasted for months.