New Yorkers Don Orange, Maroon for Virginia Tech
New Yorkers are showing support for the Virginia Tech community on Friday by wearing the school's colors in observance of "Orange and Maroon Effect" day.
Konrad Fiedler
Virginia Tech alumni from around the region and others gather in Washington Square Park Thursday evening to pay tribute to those killed earlier in the week on the campus in Blacksburg, Va.
Alumni and friends of the university arrived in maroon and orange at Washington Square Park for a candlelight vigil last night. Virginia Tech graduates read out the names of the 32 victims as mourners lit one another's candles. The original flame came from a candle that Rabbi Yehuda Sarna, who traveled to the school the day after Monday's attack, brought back from a vigil there on Wednesday.
As the ceremony commenced, a person in the crowd started to chant, "Let's go Hokies," followed by a series of claps. Slowly, those assembled joined in, and the park echoed in homage to the professors and students killed.
Two students from New York University who traveled to the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg, Va., with Rabbi Sarna addressed the crowd of nearly 200 about their experiences on the campus.
Lindsay Katona and Nicole Vengrove spoke of the sense of community they felt in Blacksburg in the days following the massacre. The students carried a sign that read, "NYU stands with you."
"Everywhere we turned, people stopped and hugged us," Ms. Katona said.
On Friday, some from last night's crowd will travel to Washington, D.C., to mourn the tragedy with other Virginia Tech graduates.
A group of alumni from New York and Philadelphia plans to meet with other Hokies at a bar in Washington, D.C., called the Liberty Tavern, several alumni said.
"I think we all feel like we need to be surrounded by fellow Hokies right now," an alumna and organizer of the Washington event, Mary Beth Rust, 27, said.
The response from alumni in the New York City area, who are planning car pools and purchasing train tickets, has been incredible, Ms. Rust said. "They're saying they'll do whatever it takes to get here," she said.
A New York-based fashion designer who graduated from Virginia Tech, Kari Anne Kaldon, said she is taking the day off from work to attend the event. "Everybody has been so frightened. It's going to be good to get together again like we did in college," she said.
Virginia Tech alumni and friends from across the country have been organizing Friday's "Orange and Maroon Effect" day to boost campus spirit. Many students plan to wear T-shirts painted with the slogan that the student government sells before each year's football season.
