Sydney may have changed, but we don't have to - Women's Agenda

Sydney may have changed, but we don’t have to

As naive as it is, we never thought this would happen in our beautiful city.

A regular Monday morning, our harbour city bathed in sunshine, tourists and workers getting their coffee fix.

I worked in Martin Place for five years. I know almost every metre of the pedestrian walkway and like so many others would often treat myself at the Lindt cafe.

It’s what made watching what was happening yesterday seem so surreal. We Sydney-siders felt it could have so easily been us, caught up in the cafe along with those who were unlucky enough to be rostered on to work.

Sydney is my hometown and I live north of the bridge. The clichéd line that Sydney would be shut down if and when the Harbour Bridge was closed almost rang true.

As I ran to get a bus to cover the unfolding siege, my neighbour yelled out to me that I wouldn’t be able to get into the city. “The bridge is closed!”

Like so many statements made yesterday, his was incorrect. Yet instead of a 10 minute bus-ride across the bridge, I took two buses and a train to get into the city. The southbound lanes on the bridge were eerily empty with most buses halting services.

As I walked off the train at Wynyard I was faced with a wall of terrified looking people trying to get on the train and out of the city.

Walking through Wynyard station to Martin Place was also spooky. Very few shops in the train station precinct were open, streets were devoid of the busy lunchtime crowd and I did most of my phone crosses standing in the middle of a bus lane on Castlereagh Street, looking up towards the Lindt cafe.

There were very few cars on the road and not many people walking through the streets.

Towards the police cordon however, it was busy. Media crews jostling for prime position, alongside passers-by who couldn’t look away.

Some were idiotic. I saw people taking selfies and others sitting in the gutter drinking beer as if we were at an entertaining event.

But most were respectful. It was uncannily quiet apart from reporters doing live crosses.

And that respect, coupled with the outpouring of emotion on social media, is something positive I will remember about this terrible day.

From my personal Facebook feed where friends from all around the world reached out to their Sydney friends and shared their concern for the hostages, to the mostly sensitive reporting on Twitter. Finally, the hashtags #PrayForSydney and #illridewithyou on Twitter and Instagram which helped heal our heaving hearts.

Showing support and mateship to fellow Australians is what we are about.

The world may have changed, but we don’t have to.

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