Moving Images

In the newspaper today there are photos of the dead. I'm struck by how young they seem. On the front page: Anthony Fatayi-Williams, a 26-year-old Nigerian engineering executive whose father, a doctor, is Muslim; Sharaha Islam, a pretty, 20-year-old, second-generation Bengali immigrant who worked as a bank cashier; Jamie Gordan, 30, who spent his early years in Zimbabwe; Shyanuja Parathasangary, a 30-year-old Sri Lankan who worked for the postal service.
Inside, there are four more photos: Mohammad Sidique Khan, also 30, a former counselor at a primary school; Shehzad Tanweer, a shy-looking 22-year-old sports science major at Leeds Metropolitan University; Hasib Mir Hussain, an 18-year-old who studied business at a local vocational School; and Lindsey Germaine, a 19-year-old who was born in Jamaica but lived in Leeds.
All 8 of them--and at least 47 others--died on July 7th in the London bombings. But unlike the four whose photos graced the front page, the four listed above knew they would be dying that morning. They deliberately carried bombs onto three subway trains and a double-decker bus during the morning rush hour and detonated them, blowing themselves up along with any unsuspecting passengers on the three trains leaving the Edgeware Road station (7 killed), the Liverpool Street Station (7+ killed), and the King's Cross station (27+ killed) and a bus near Tavistock Square (at least 14 killed).
The four were captured on video outside the Lution railway station. Donning beards, baseball caps and backpacks, they looked like so many other passengers boarding the train that morning. Their faces bely nothing of their intentions. I studied the close-up photos that have now been released, looking for some clue. But they look no different than those they murdered: Germaine smiles in his photo, his face pressed up against a white man's (the photo is cropped so only the friend's left eye and cheek are visible); Tanweer's shy smile and doe-like eyes make him appear far younger than his 22 years; Hussain has a close-cropped beard and darkly intense eyes; Khan has a round face, his eyes gaze left, avoiding the camera lens.
Who would know, by looking at them, that they were murderers? Even their families were shocked (or so they say). These were not men without food or futures, without hope. Two were students, one a school aide. They had families and friends, and lived in middle-class neighborhoods. Though three of them had Pakistani parents, they were born and raised in England.
On the subway this morning, I scanned the faces of my fellow passengers. There were two pale girls in tight pants and tee-shirts speaking in Polish; a round-faced woman with a multi-colored skirt and a Jamaican accent; a tall, black man in a basketball jersey; a slim Asian woman in a white peasant skirt and black sandals; a heavy Hispanic woman speaking Spanish to a chubby little girl with pigtails and pierced ears; and a dark-skinned man who could have been of Pakistani origin--or Indian. He wore a tee-shirt and kept his face down, reading the New York Times magazine.
What was it like for him now? I wondered. His face may have resembled those of the murderers, but his thoughts were different (or so I guessed--or hoped). Still, most of us on the train would look at him and see only his dark skin and close-cropped beard and wonder.
Because we cannot see what goes on in his mind or others'. We can only judge by what we can see. And pray that his backpack is filled only with books.