Saturday, September 11, 2021

Remembering Erica van Acker, WTC 9/11



Remembering Erica van Acker who died at the World Trade Center 20 years ago today, on September 11, 2001. Erica was a close friend of Janet Frame's friend Barbara Wersba who lived in Sag Harbor, Long Island, New York.
 When Janet Frame and I visited the Hamptons in late 2000, Barbara introduced us to Erica and her partner, and we enjoyed several dinner parties and outings in their company during our stay. Erica was an excellent chef and a stimulating conversationalist. We had a lot of fun and a lot of laughs. Janet was always much more relaxed when she was away from New Zealand where so many people unfortunately treated her like a 'freak' (her own words). New York is anything but narrow-minded, and Janet loved it there.

9/11

Erica had told me she worked part time at the WTC and so at first I hoped that she hadn't been there on the day of the attacks. Sadly, we soon heard from Barbara that Erica had lost her life there.


The injustice of this sentence in Erica's NYT obituary (below) is heartbreaking: 
"She has no immediate survivors." In that era same-sex partners of victims were seldom officially acknowledged.



In 2012 while on a trip to New York I made a pilgrimage to the memorial at Ground Zero and paid my respects to Erica. 
(Photo: Christine White)


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