UCLA students in Paris reflect upon terror attacks in city

All UCLA travelers, including 53 students in Paris, are safe after a series of attacks on the city Friday night, UCLA officials have confirmed.

In a series of eight attacks as a part of what authorities called a coordinated terrorist assault, including suicide bombs and shootings across the French capital, nearly 130 people were killed and hundreds were injured as of Sunday, according to The New York Times.

The attacks were spread across the city including the Stade de France stadium, popular restaurants such as Le Petit Cambodge and the Bataclan, a music hall.

According to authorities, the series of attacks were conducted by three teams of Islamic State attackers including three French citizens. Seven of the attackers died and authorities are still looking for an eighth suspect.

Julia Nista, a third-year political science student studying abroad in Paris, said she was out exploring the Louvre Museum when she suggested to her friend they should eat at Le Petit Cambodge, a restaurant she found on BuzzFeed. However, Nista’s friend thought the Cambodian restaurant was too far, so they went to a nearby Indian eatery instead.

Hours later, Le Petit Cambodge would be one of the target sites in the series of attacks where 10 people died and 15 were injured.

“It was the most ironic, but incredibly scary, situation,” Nista said.

As they left the restaurant, Nista said she received a text from a friend in the United States who said that a shooting had just happened in Paris.

“I was like, ‘what shooting?’, I hadn’t gotten any emails or texts,” Nista said. “I thought it was something at a small scale.”

Nista said she could not believe the news since everything in the heart of Paris near the Opéra seemed normal still. Then she found out about the bombings at the Stade de France where some of her friends from her study abroad program were watching the soccer game, she said.

“I said, ‘we need to stop and call some people.’” Nista said. “We were really quiet for a while and then we said, ‘We’ve got to go home. We can’t be out on the streets of Paris.’”

Olivia Rosato, a third-year art history student, was visiting a friend from Paris and she said her friends decided they would venture out to a bar near her apartment in the 11th district, which later was another target location.

About 15 minutes before Rosato left with friends to have a night out in Paris, she said she received a phone call from a friend telling her not to leave her apartment as he could hear explosions outside his apartment near the Bataclan.

“We were about to leave and my friend called me; he heard explosions outside his window and said ‘Don’t leave the house’,” Rosato said. “(Then there were) tons of police, and we heard a ton of sirens at our street.”

The entire event was surreal, Rosato said, since she lives in the 11th district and had gone out to eat at Le Petit Cambodge before.

“I was in complete shock the first night,” Rosato said. “The events had not sunk in and I was not able to express any emotion initially.”

Both Nista and Rosta said friends and family from the United States kept calling to ensure they were safe as they didn’t know how much the violence had spread.

Sunday brought a new life to the city, however, Rosato said, people were out and continuing to live their lives.

“Yesterday I was less in shock and more scared, I didn’t leave the house,” Rosato said. “French officials said to stay indoors, (the police were still) searching for assailants. The idea of the metro felt really unsafe. (Being in an) enclosed space, you can’t escape.”

Rosato said she and her friends went to a park and ventured out for lunch and dinner. She added they weren’t afraid of being in public in the city that had just seen so much violence.

“The night it happened I thought it was crazy and that in a week, the (routine of daily life would) reinstate itself,” Rosato said. “It has a natural way even if you are fearful, the trauma decreases in a strange way.”

Rosato said she was surprised by how quickly the French picked back up their way of life, even though there was a somber feeling in the air.

“(Parisians are) sad and empathetic, but resilient to the fact that this situation couldn’t rob them on their right to live and be in their city,” she said.

Contributing reports by Julia Raven, Bruin senior staff from Paris.