27/4/10
On today's siyur, we traveled north to the wine country around Zichron Yakov, and the official Naval Base in Haifa. Israel makes some fantastic wine. With the climate of Napa Valley and the required extra processes that are needed to make the wine kasher, the wines we tasted today were EXQUISITE! It was a little pathetic that most of the group was chugging the stuff to get drunk before lunch, but hey, it's YC, what can you do?
Zichron Yakov is an adorable, beautiful town, surrounded by wineries and containing interesting history - one of the houses nearby was used as an underground Haganah station before the creation of Israel, and is now a museum. Zichron also has the best ice cream in Israel (even though they're changing it into a local chain *sad*), and it was DELICIOUS!
By the time we got to the Naval Base, I was exhausted, but it was still interesting to see. I could never be in the Navy. Besides my issues with being in the army in general, we toured a missile ship, and the claustrophobia alone would drive me over the edge within a few hours! I'm in awe of the tzofim who are going to be stationed there next year.
I'm fried for the day, so I'm going to keep this post short, but I just wanted to give a quick update on what's been going on.
Can't believe I'm seeing you all in a month!
Love,
Rachel
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
KUMA (finally!)
Okay, so after days of typing, here is the long-awaited Kuma post. My journal from that week explains more than reflection can, so everything below is my words from those days. Enjoy..and comment please!
15/3/10
The Night Before…Liftoff!
The lack of sleep saga has begun. After a goodbye dinner with my roomies at Benedict’s, I scrambled to throw my things together and hopped onto the bus at 1:00 am. Following the orders of a very sleepy Joe, I called everyone to make sure they were ready and sent Joe to bed soundly when everyone was onboard. Even on the ride to the airport, it still hadn’t hit me that I was going to Poland. In a strange way, it still hasn’t.
Right now, I’m sitting in Ben Gurion airpot, waiting for our delayed flight to get going. My eyes are bloodshot, my body aches from sleeping on the ground, and all I want to do is pass out on the plane. Nevertheless, I’m also really pumped to get started. Before I left, everyone asked me if I was excited to leave for Kuma and I never knew what to say. I’m not excited to see horrors that have given me nightmares for years, I’m not excited to cry my eyes out for my people, I’m not excited to finally understand the Shoa on a level beyond books. What then, am I looking forward to? I decided to go on Kuma after the intense ride I went through with “Friedl” and “Through Children’s’ Eyes”. After feeling almost enmeshed with the Shoa and Terezin during these performances, I applied for Kuma looking for some form of closure. Now, after seeing how different I am after six months of Year Course and hearing peoples past accounts of Kuma, I’m not sure if closure is possible. I’m not going to deny that this scares me a little. My reaction to the Shoa in the past has been unbelievably powerful, and a huge part of me is still terrified that I won’t be able to handle the things we’re going to see. I suppose I won’t die from crying, but the depression surrounding such intensity is intimidating.
Finally, I’m sitting on the plane. Seat 19D. Around me are chanichim from all three sections who all have their own reasons for embarking on this week of insanity. In four hours, I’m going to be walking off the plane and onto the land where six million of my people were brutally murdered. I’m going to walk proudly into a still largely anti-Semitic country with Israeli soil caked into my boots from our last tiyul. In a matter of hours, I’m going to be standing in places my own family stood 100 years ago. What would they think if they could see me now? I can only hope that the knowledge I gain in the next seven days and my determination to pass it on will be enough to make them proud of me. This trip is for David and Judith Schoenzeit, Leslie, Eli, Ela, Petr, Hana, Tella, Teddy, Friedl, and most of all, for the future me who will continue to tell these stories.
15/3/10
Yesh Eretz K’mo Ze? (Is there a land like this one?)
After and incredibly long day/night of travel, we finally arrived in Poland. There was a snow storm last night, so overlooking the country during landing felt like staring down at a winter wonderland. I almost lost my passport on the plane (props to me…) but the flight attendants were awesome and I got it back without any problems. At baggage claim, we threw on coats, scarves, hats, and gloves and started our journey… It’s fucking freezing here…
Driving through Warsaw was surreal. The city was snow-covered and modern, and if I didn’t know I was in Poland, I probably wouldn’t have guessed. It felt strange to be so mesmerized by a place that holds such a terrible past, but the winter here is breathtakingly gorgeous. I’m happy here…I guess? That sounds strange, but I’m sticking with it.
Our first stop was the Okopowa St. Jewish Cemetery. Usually associated with death and grief, the cemetery turned our to be a surprisingly fun and inspiring place. Rather than mournful, the cemetery celebrated the thriving Jewish population that lived in Warsaw for hundreds of years before the Holocaust. The 2nd largest in Poland, the cemetery is home to 250,000 souls, stretching throughout Polish history. Among the graves were Yitzhak L. Paritz (the revolutionary writer who wrote the first Yiddish fiction), Reb Chayim Solovechik (whose grandson founded Yeshiva University), and members of the Bund (the socialist Jewish movement – all of whom were killed in the Shoa). Along with an inappropriate snowball here and there, it was a great stop.
Next, we visited the Korczak Orphanage. Korczak was akin to Friedl Dicker Brandeis in his heroism involving children. His philosophies inspired and saved hundreds of children from falling into depression or ending up on the streets. When his students were taken to the gas chambers, he insisted on going with them. His love of children still influences education today. I was really moved by the orphanage. It felt nice to be in a place with so much love radiating from it. I learned a little bit more when we read his children’s bill of rights. Sometimes when my moms come home with their stories about the foster kids they work with, Korczal’s words are all I want to scream at the parents.
The third stop of the day was the Umschlagplatz – the train station where Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto would be loaded on to cattle cars and shipped to Treblinka. This was our first exposure to standing on horror’s history. Even on a place where no blood was spilt, it felt almost contaminating to stand in a real, tangible place where Nazis destroyed Jewish lives. It makes me wonder (worry) how I’m going to handle Tykochin and Treblinka tomorrow. Then names on the wall hit me the hardest. The walls of the Umschlagplatz are covered in first names and scattered family names. I saw “Marcia” and “Stephen” (the names of my grandparents) and paused. It made me realize that if my family hadn’t left, those names could have easily been my grandparents…I might not exist today. It was truly humbling and chilling.
The last stop for today was the Nozik Synagogue. Sadly, it’s the last working Synagoge in Poland to still hold daily services. It’s currently being restored, but it’s easy to see its grandeur. During WWII, the Nazis turned it into horse stables, and eventually it was almost destroyed. It’s gross that anyone could do that to a religious building of any kind, but I suppose the behavior’s not surprising since they also turned Torah scrolls into shoe soles…
Today was nowhere near as intense as the rest of the trip is going to be, but after no sleep, it was a great intro to Warsaw and the Polish “feel”. I’m not sure how I feel about being in Poland in general yet. The concept itself is still slightly disturbing, and I don’t see tomorrow helping out at all, but I’m going to try hard to stay open and accept any opinion changes or new perspectives that hit me throughout the week.
16/3/10
They Weren’t Joking
I woke up today, refreshed for the first time in six months. Staying in a hotel definitely has its perks! In a strange way, I felt really excited for the day throughout breakfast. I guess it’s not unexpected, but given where we went today, I felt strange in my anticipation…
Our first stop of the day was the small town of Tykocin. Everything about the place, including the entire bus ride there, was entirely surreal. Looking out the window, I watched the world go from modern Warsaw to Fiddler on the Roof. The snow accented the barns and the woods, and with every second, I felt like I was going back in time. I became so enthralled by the scene that it was almost a cruel dose of reality when the snow-covered phone lines glared at me as glowing white crosses.
Tykocin itself is a bit like Corvallis: small town, Center Square, a few big buildings, and a lot of small town houses. It used to be a center of Polish Jewry – 2,000 Jews beginning with the first settlers in the early 1600s. Today, not a single Jew inhabits the vicinity. Why? In 1941, Germans raided Tykocin in Operation Barbarossa. Every Jew was marched out to the forest and murdered by the Einzatzgruppen in shooting pits. Seeing the town was interesting, but it didn’t prepare me for what was to come. Walking down the snowy path to the shooting pits was almost like a terrifying flashback. I could feel the fear surrounding the place, hear the trucks, smell the death. Looking at the shooting pits, I couldn’t cry. I couldn’t cry because I was too busy wrapping my head around the fact that only a few feet below me, 2,000 people met their ends. The sheer mass overwhelmed me. During Mike’s reading, I felt tears coming, but I pushed them back. It was finally when walking back to the bus that I broke. My head swirled with images of frail, naked bodies, and blood bubbling up from the ground. The freezing cold froze the tears on my face, and for a moment, I forgot the deaths occurred 70 years ago.
Treblinka was the first death camp I’ve ever stepped foot in. Oddly, I wasn’t overwhelmed with emotion. Having been destroyed by the Germans, a large memorial is all that remains of the 800,000 who were murdered there. The most shocking thing about Treblinka was finding my family’s stone. I never thought about my family in relation to the Shoa. They left Poland in the 1880s and had nothing to do with WWII. Seeing the “Augustow” stone, however, made me realize that I probably had distant family who DID die in the Shoa. I’ve never felt more connected to my family history, or more grateful for their bravery than I did at that moment.
More than anything, certain aspects of Treblinka made me just plain sick. The fact that people live five minutes away is disgusting. The fact that the Nazis dressed up the station is appalling. The fact that the curtain to the gas chambers was the cover to an Ark is nauseating. I’m angry at humanity, but hoping to find something besides anger in the coming days. Tachanah Treblinka…
17/3/10
Let Our Fate Be a Warning
Today was the hardest day yet. Fully centered on the events of the Shoa, we spent the day outside – depressed and freezing. It’s never all bad – we make each other laugh, and everyone feels like family, but early in the morning, it’s easy to feel lost in one’s desire for warmth.
The morning was spent looking at the Warsaw Ghetto and the events of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Just as the Umschlagplatz is nothing but a memorial, the Ghetto is nothing but a single wall that once belonged to a factory. Nevertheless, its impact is not lost. Amidst the modern apartments, the battered, blood-red wall is a symbol of the unofficial death camp. In the frigid weather, it physically hurt to imagine our situation in a summer dress and on 184 calories per day. Being here, seeing everything, I have such respect and awe for the survivors of ANY part of the Shoa. Truth be told, I don’t think I would have had their will power. I don’t think I would have survived.
The second part of the Ghetto exploration was the Mila 18 memorial. During the uprising, Mila 18 served as the headquarters for the resistance, and eventually, it became their tomb when the Nazis bombed and gassed the last of the fighters. I’ve never been fond of martyrs, but after reading the passages today about Mila 18 and the 93 girls who committed suicide rather than be raped by German soldiers, I have much more respect for the concept. When faced with death, I can’t say I know what I would do, but as someone who appreciates dignity in life, I’d like to think I’d try to keep it in death. One of the things that’s always frustrated me about the Shoa is that even when Jews knew they were being taken to their deaths, hardly any fought back, or even tried to resist. Some ran, but for the supposedly most intelligent race in the world, I guess a part of me sadly expected more. I feel guilty for writing this, but its how I feel. This thought brings me to part three – the Rappaport Memorial.
There are two versions of this famous Shoa sculpture. The original stands in Warsaw, and the copy stands in Yad Vashem. The controversy of this dedication comes in its sides. The front depicts strong, God-like Jews (the resistance fighters) and the back portrays that “weak sheep” of the death camps. Many in Israel are still angry at the survivors of the camps for not fighting back. I’m conflicted about this. On the one hand, I can’t blame anyone in the Shoa for their fate, but on the other hand, I wish more had had the bravery of Mila 18. What would I have done?
Our second stop of the day was the death camp Majdanek. This was a completely different experience than Treblinka. My heart almost stopped when I looked out the window today and saw the full-fledged camp. No memorials. Everything was there. The barbed wire fences, the bunkers, the watch towers, the gas chambers, the crematoriums. Everything. Driving into Majdanek almost felt like we ere being taken there ourselves. Walking through the gas chambers, I instinctually avoided walking under the showers, terrified that they would open after 70 dormant years. The place felt like death. The beds held the original mattresses, the walls had fingernail scratchings on them, the gas chambers still held cans of zyclone B. In a separate barrack, thousands of shoes – big and small – piled high to the ceiling. I broke at the dusty laces. Next to the crematorium was a pile of dirt – or so we thought. On November 3, 1944, the “Harvest Festival” took place, and the Nazis murdered 18,000 in a single day (in reaction to the Sobibor revolt). They buried them in shooting pits for lack of time, and when the local people found the bodies, they burned them. The dirt in front of us was actually the collective ashed of 18,000 people…I couldn’t cry, but I did nearly hurl.
To some extent, I feel guilty for not crying more. After awhile though, I became too shocked/sad to cry. It’s easy to cry from the comfort, but to step into the most evil place on earth, it almost feels as though your soul has temporarily left your body.
After dinner in Lublin, we took a quick trip to the local Yeshiva and learned its story. A much happier experience, it felt amazing to look at a page of Talmud in a place of Jewish learning after a horror-filled day. I’m proud of my people. I’m proud to be Jewish.
18/3/10
There Once Was a World
Today was officially dubbed “ridiculously long bus day”, even thought the Madrichim tried to pretend it wasn’t. Making our way from Lublin to Krakow, we spent 11 hours on the bus with three stops in the midst of our journey. The stops were interesting, but still, bus riding was surprisingly intense.
Our first stop was Lejansk – an old Chassidic town. We learned about the Chassidic movement and Rabbi Eli Melech’s influence in Poland. I was surprisingly fascinated by this stop. Even though I consider myself more spiritual than religious, there was something incredibly moving about being in a past center of Judaism and Jewish life. Listening to ancient prayers and seeing the dedication still given to Reb Melech, I was reminded of just how powerful the idea of Jewish community can be. When I wrote my note to the great Rabbi, I truly felt, more a moment, the same magic of the Kotel. It’s humbling to feel moments of massive connection, and even though I’m not a Chasid, I felt a part of their history – of my history.
Our second stop was hard. After much driving, we reached the small town of Bobovo and the small, surrounding forest. We walked for about half an hour into a small enclave of trees and stumbled upon a moss-covered, cracked gravesite. Neglected and forgotten was the mass grave of the Jews of Bobovo. Beneath our feet, completely nameless, lay the bodies of 700 women and children. Mass graves are much scarier than death camps. At the death camps, the bodies are gone, we know much more of what transpired and who was killed, and everyone remembers. Mass graves are different. The people below us had been forgotten, the Kaddish unsaid, the trees erasing their lives from the rest of the world. 700 people simply evaporated. We read quotes from children before the Shoa. It was chilling to realize that all of them had been us. They fought with their parents, didn’t like their vegetables, stressed over school, loved sports and music. I can’t imagine dealing with what they went through at an age when my biggest concern of the day was what the lunch lady would be serving. Would I have had their strength? Their courage?
Our last stop of the day was in Nove-Sacz – the town where one of my peer’s grandfathers was from. It’s really fascinating that so many of us are from Poland. It feels incredible to be returning after so many generations, and under such different circumstances. I hope my family would be proud.
19/3/10
There is Evil in the Air
Auschwitz-Birkenau is the portal to hell. Majdanek was hard. I’d never seen a real camp before, and it felt chilling, but it was nothing compared to today. Everything about the largest Nazi death camp reeks of evil and death. The air is thick with tortured souls and the fear of millions all those years ago. The sheer length of the walk along the train tracks was enough to stop the world around me. With every step, I heard the rumble of the cattle cars and screams of thousands as they struggled to breathe in the crowded, disease-filled cage. The entrance to Birkenau is huge and intimidating. I giant tower atop a red rectangle hovers eerily, surrounded by a double barbed wire, electric fence. Along the fence, every 20 feet or so, are guard towers. The space is sparse and open, and with a gun aimed at your head from every tower, there is no thought of escape. The tracks run down the middle of the camp, where they meet the selection platform and then continue on to the gas chambers and crematoriums by the forest edge. Tens of barracks sandwich the tracks – men to the right, women to the left. The men’s barracks are almost all destroyed – the wood used to make them having been stolen at the end of the war, but the women’s barracks (made of brick) are almost all fully intact. To the right of the men’s barracks, along the way to the crematoriums, are the remains of “Kanada”, the storage area where prisoners’ belongings were kept (hair, silverware, clothes, etc). There are over 30 large storehouses, and each was supposedly stuffed full in its day. Beyond the small forest edge, the death camp continues its horror. In 1944, the Bastards weren’t being efficient enough, so they extended the camp for the 400,000 Hungarian Jews who were executed in the last three months of the war. I diagrammed the basics on the next page for my own future reference, but I don’t think any of these images will soon leave my mind.
My journey through Birkenau was much harder than I anticipated. Having been told Madjanek was the hardest camp, I woke up thinking the worst was over, and while today would certainly be difficult, I was more than capable of handling it. I was wrong.
Before entering the camp, we went up to the highest guard tower and looked out over the entire complex. It’s genuinely shocking how enormous the camp is. I never learned the milage, but it took us about 20 minutes to walk a straight shot, back to front. Walking through the front entrance was one of the more terrifying experiences in the world. The famous brick archway is actually as scary as it looks in the photos. We walked some distance along the tracks until we arrived at the selection platform. Reading testimony in front of one of the actual cars, I felt tears welling up behind my tired eyes. I reached out and touched the old wood, and it felt tainted. Eerie wind blew across, and for the first time, I felt as though I was back in 1943, being shoved off the car and into lines I didn’t understand. Perhaps I made it through, perhaps I didn’t, but regardless, I had to stand in a line, waiting my turn, watching the fate of my loved ones completely helplessly. 1943 me passed the selection, and cried as 2010 me moved towards the women’s barracks in a coma. The barracks were dark, dusty, dingy, and tiny. It was hard to imagine how anyone slept at night. Between the stench, the cold, and the fear, I fear many might have died from pure exhaustion. The biggest breakdown came in the latrine. Holes in a counter top, the latrine was essentially a giant pit with concrete holes over it. Hearing the stories of the degrading things that occurred involving human excrement, I leaned my head against the window and wept. Death is never dignified, but the least people can do is attempt to make it calm and semi-dignified. The Nazis were not humans. No human can watch another human drowning in his own excrement and laugh. No human can use another’s mouth as a target in piss-aiming practice and to sleep with a clean conscience. More than ever, the question that weighed most heavily on my mind was how could someone do this? How could a living being ever justify taking another life? We left the latrine, but I couldn’t stop crying. The camp was finally real. Birkenau was no longer a place of legend – one that I could attempt to distance myself from. The millions who lost their lives; their souls, were now a part of mine; their stories no longer foreign, but physically real. I cannot pretend to completely understand their suffering, but I can say that the degree to which I felt a part of Birkenau in those moments was almost unbearable. When we were given personal time and asked to write a letter, it took 15 minutes just for my hand to stop shaking, for my tears to stop falling. Eventually, I wrote my letter to Ela Weisberger, a survivor of Terezin and Auschwitz. I didn’t know what to say, so I just spilled all of my conflicted emotion and tried to express how in awe I was of her and other survivors.
Our next stops in the camp were the ruins of the far gas chambers and crematoriums in the back of Birkenau. Thankfully, they’re too destroyed to enter, but affect was strong enough without the added experience. Some how, even though I was still overcome, I couldn’t cry anymore. It felt as though my body physically couldn’t handle any more death, and so rather than mourn, I had instead become too numb to feel. As a result, the rest of the experience passed in a bit of a blur. We walked through Kanada and the warehouses and finally did our ending Tekes by the ash lakes. I finally snapped back to reality on the way out as I slowly began to realize the impact of what had just transpired. Me, a Polish, Jewish girl, had just passed through all of Birkenau and come out without a scratch (at least physically). That realization felt like an extremely satisfying “fuck you” to every Nazi who ever so much as glared at one of my people. That realization also enabled me to eat lunch – something I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to stomach after seeing the camp.
After lunch, we drove a few minutes to the Labor/Concentration Camp of Auschwitz. I feel almost guilty in admitting that after the morning, I felt almost nothing at the college-campus-esque Auschwitz 1. In contrast to Birkenau, Auschwitz has been converted into a museum and is dedicated mainly to presenting hard facts instead of emotional stories. Facts are important, but nearly irrelevant to a group of well-educated Jews who are here in Poland to connect to the Shoa, not to learn its logistics. I appreciate the significance of the museum, especially in relation to Holocaust Deniers, it just didn’t mean very much to me. One room, however, nearly knocked all of us onto the floor. In amongst the cold facts, is the hardest room to enter in Auschwitz. In a giant room are huge glass cases with the contents of the Kanada warehouses – including a case holding two tons of human hair cut from prisoners on their way to the gas chambers. Opposite it was a case of children’s clothes. In some of the other cases were suitcases, tallits, pots, pans, and other items. It shoved the reality of six million into our faces. I kept it together, but the impact was definitely not lost.
Tonight, we tried to recover from the day with Shabbas. Shabbat in Krakow was wonderful. For the first time in seven months, it really felt like Shabbat. We got ready, prayed, stuffed our faces, and sang corny songs. For shul, we went to the Rama Synagogue across from our hotel. Even though it was old-fashioned Orthodox and we were stuck behind a wall, a large part of me still loved the experience! Mike led the service and it was great to follow someone we knew. I couldn’t follow along the entire service, but I knew all the basic songs and prayers. After a long week of Jewish destruction, it felt unbelievable to be included in my heritage.
20/3/10
Shabbas Day in Krakow
Got to sleep in till 10:00!!!!!!!!!!!! It was the most amazing thing the world. =D I missed breakfast, but Judith gave me a granola bar, so kol besder im ani. Around 11, we went on a brisk tour of the Synagogues of the Old Jewish Quarter. Among them, we saw the first Shul in Krakow (built like a castle), the first reform synagogue in Poland (extremely cool), and we took a better look at the Rama Shul and its history (also very cool, but hard to focus on as my stomach was being particularly talkative. The reform shul was the most interesting to me. It was amazing to see the roots of Kol Ami (in a way) from hundreds of years ago, and even though it still held remnants of Orthodoxy, it was shocking how at home I felt there.
After lunch (which was intense!), we went to our processing groups to discuss the issue of God in the Holocaust. We read a passage by Eli Weisel and then the interpretations of God in the Holocaust by various Rabbis. Many claimed the Shoa had to have been some kind of punishment, for Hashem never acts without a reason. I was appalled and strongly disagreed. While I try to see a reason behind everything, I have huge issues with a God that would brutally murder 6 million innocent people as an unclear punishment. Regardless of Zionism, or assimilation, or competing Jewish factions, there is nothing in human history that justifies genocide, no matter what culture or people. I had a hard time with the processing group, but it raised a lot of great questions that are now part of my never-ending food for thought.
In the afternoon, a few of us went on a tour of non-Jewish Krakow. It was awesome! We walked by the place where “Schindler’s List” was filmed, saw the Wawel Castle, heard the legend of the Krakow Dragon, saw the main university, and shopped in the city market square. We even saw dressed-up Polish soldiers – which was oddly unsettling for reasons I don’t understand. Unfortunately, with all the fun, we also got our first dose of physical, directed anti-Semitism. Four of us were walking by a bench of Polish men, and as we tried to pass, they stuck their legs out to trip us. When we walked around and away with annoyed faces, they murmured “Juden” under their breath. I didn’t think anti-Semitism was still that strong, but apparently I was really naïve. The event shook us, but we quickly came to realize it wasn’t worth our trouble and moved on.
Kabbalat Shabbat was beautiful. We sang in a circle outside and felt loopy and happy. Afterwards, we went to the Galicia Jewish museum to see a photography exhibit and hear testimony from a righteous gentile. The photography exhibit was gorgeous. An English photographer, Christopher Schwartz, whose grandfather was Jewish, making Chris “Jewish enough for Adolph Hitler”, put it together. Chris traveled around Poland for months documenting Jewish life before and after the Shoa, mainly focusing on places that people either don’t visit often, or that have been completely forgotten. I was really moved by the photographs of the concentration camp, Belzec. Despite the fact that thousands of Jews were murdered there, all that remains is a plowed-over field. It killed me to think that we spend so much time remembering those who died in the major camps, but there are so many nameless victims that we never think to mention.
I didn’t particularly care for the speaker, but I respect what he’s trying to do. His story was hard to follow, but I highly respect the fact that he helped save Jews in his home and as a member of the Partisans. All in all, a fabulous Shabbas.
21/3/10
The Final Day
Today was back to a 6:00 wake up, =( We stuffed our suitcases, ate breakfast, and started the last day of our Kuma Journey. Our first stop was the cemetery at the Rama Synagogue. Originally disappointed at the idea of going to yet another cemetery, I was pleasantly surprised with the experience. We saw the graves that the local population restored after the Nazis raided the place, the five graves that were left standing, the wall made of the unfixable graves, and heard a remarkable story of Yosele the Meiser. We tried to do rubbings of the graves, but they were very unsuccessful…
Our second stop was an old, abandoned Kibbutz. We learned the story of the devour youth who eventually perished there, and had our final Tekes in Poland. I wasn’t enthralled by the story, but I definitely see the merit in being passionate and action-oriented about an issue or issues. I love being passionate about music/arts awareness, animal conservation, and gay rights back home, and I know that these are issues that I will always continue to devote myself to. I also really loved being a part of the final Tekes. It felt great to be able to be part of the expression of the week – the ups, downs, changes, and things to look forward to. Doing the Tekes forced me to think about just how much I experienced this wekk and how much my perspectives have canged. I went on Kuma with a lot of expectations, worries, and questions. The experience was everything I didn’t expect and more than I could have ever imagined. I laughed, I cried, I hugged, I isolated, I grew, I feared, and I did everything I could to embrace the experience and I still wish I could have learned more. I gained an appreciateion for my family and my history that I could never have gotten in Israel. My faith in God was challenged and wavered, but at the end, I find I feel even more spiritual and connected that I did seven days ago. Kuma is a strange catalyst…
Our final stop was the previous home of one of my peer’s family. It was really incredible to see her reaction to the building where her family lived. I only wish I could have been so lucky. Afterwards, we stopped for lunch at this ridiculous tourist spot and I nearly killed myself on Perokies. Fun and yummy, but painful.
Now, we’re sitting in the airport about to head back to Israel to finish our Journey at the Kotel. I’m excited to go back home. After a week of intensity, it’s going to feel incredible to return to Eretz Yisrael. Until then,
Rachel Smith-Weinstein, Witstenetski, Schoenzeit, Siskind.
15/3/10
The Night Before…Liftoff!
The lack of sleep saga has begun. After a goodbye dinner with my roomies at Benedict’s, I scrambled to throw my things together and hopped onto the bus at 1:00 am. Following the orders of a very sleepy Joe, I called everyone to make sure they were ready and sent Joe to bed soundly when everyone was onboard. Even on the ride to the airport, it still hadn’t hit me that I was going to Poland. In a strange way, it still hasn’t.
Right now, I’m sitting in Ben Gurion airpot, waiting for our delayed flight to get going. My eyes are bloodshot, my body aches from sleeping on the ground, and all I want to do is pass out on the plane. Nevertheless, I’m also really pumped to get started. Before I left, everyone asked me if I was excited to leave for Kuma and I never knew what to say. I’m not excited to see horrors that have given me nightmares for years, I’m not excited to cry my eyes out for my people, I’m not excited to finally understand the Shoa on a level beyond books. What then, am I looking forward to? I decided to go on Kuma after the intense ride I went through with “Friedl” and “Through Children’s’ Eyes”. After feeling almost enmeshed with the Shoa and Terezin during these performances, I applied for Kuma looking for some form of closure. Now, after seeing how different I am after six months of Year Course and hearing peoples past accounts of Kuma, I’m not sure if closure is possible. I’m not going to deny that this scares me a little. My reaction to the Shoa in the past has been unbelievably powerful, and a huge part of me is still terrified that I won’t be able to handle the things we’re going to see. I suppose I won’t die from crying, but the depression surrounding such intensity is intimidating.
Finally, I’m sitting on the plane. Seat 19D. Around me are chanichim from all three sections who all have their own reasons for embarking on this week of insanity. In four hours, I’m going to be walking off the plane and onto the land where six million of my people were brutally murdered. I’m going to walk proudly into a still largely anti-Semitic country with Israeli soil caked into my boots from our last tiyul. In a matter of hours, I’m going to be standing in places my own family stood 100 years ago. What would they think if they could see me now? I can only hope that the knowledge I gain in the next seven days and my determination to pass it on will be enough to make them proud of me. This trip is for David and Judith Schoenzeit, Leslie, Eli, Ela, Petr, Hana, Tella, Teddy, Friedl, and most of all, for the future me who will continue to tell these stories.
15/3/10
Yesh Eretz K’mo Ze? (Is there a land like this one?)
After and incredibly long day/night of travel, we finally arrived in Poland. There was a snow storm last night, so overlooking the country during landing felt like staring down at a winter wonderland. I almost lost my passport on the plane (props to me…) but the flight attendants were awesome and I got it back without any problems. At baggage claim, we threw on coats, scarves, hats, and gloves and started our journey… It’s fucking freezing here…
Driving through Warsaw was surreal. The city was snow-covered and modern, and if I didn’t know I was in Poland, I probably wouldn’t have guessed. It felt strange to be so mesmerized by a place that holds such a terrible past, but the winter here is breathtakingly gorgeous. I’m happy here…I guess? That sounds strange, but I’m sticking with it.
Our first stop was the Okopowa St. Jewish Cemetery. Usually associated with death and grief, the cemetery turned our to be a surprisingly fun and inspiring place. Rather than mournful, the cemetery celebrated the thriving Jewish population that lived in Warsaw for hundreds of years before the Holocaust. The 2nd largest in Poland, the cemetery is home to 250,000 souls, stretching throughout Polish history. Among the graves were Yitzhak L. Paritz (the revolutionary writer who wrote the first Yiddish fiction), Reb Chayim Solovechik (whose grandson founded Yeshiva University), and members of the Bund (the socialist Jewish movement – all of whom were killed in the Shoa). Along with an inappropriate snowball here and there, it was a great stop.
Next, we visited the Korczak Orphanage. Korczak was akin to Friedl Dicker Brandeis in his heroism involving children. His philosophies inspired and saved hundreds of children from falling into depression or ending up on the streets. When his students were taken to the gas chambers, he insisted on going with them. His love of children still influences education today. I was really moved by the orphanage. It felt nice to be in a place with so much love radiating from it. I learned a little bit more when we read his children’s bill of rights. Sometimes when my moms come home with their stories about the foster kids they work with, Korczal’s words are all I want to scream at the parents.
The third stop of the day was the Umschlagplatz – the train station where Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto would be loaded on to cattle cars and shipped to Treblinka. This was our first exposure to standing on horror’s history. Even on a place where no blood was spilt, it felt almost contaminating to stand in a real, tangible place where Nazis destroyed Jewish lives. It makes me wonder (worry) how I’m going to handle Tykochin and Treblinka tomorrow. Then names on the wall hit me the hardest. The walls of the Umschlagplatz are covered in first names and scattered family names. I saw “Marcia” and “Stephen” (the names of my grandparents) and paused. It made me realize that if my family hadn’t left, those names could have easily been my grandparents…I might not exist today. It was truly humbling and chilling.
The last stop for today was the Nozik Synagogue. Sadly, it’s the last working Synagoge in Poland to still hold daily services. It’s currently being restored, but it’s easy to see its grandeur. During WWII, the Nazis turned it into horse stables, and eventually it was almost destroyed. It’s gross that anyone could do that to a religious building of any kind, but I suppose the behavior’s not surprising since they also turned Torah scrolls into shoe soles…
Today was nowhere near as intense as the rest of the trip is going to be, but after no sleep, it was a great intro to Warsaw and the Polish “feel”. I’m not sure how I feel about being in Poland in general yet. The concept itself is still slightly disturbing, and I don’t see tomorrow helping out at all, but I’m going to try hard to stay open and accept any opinion changes or new perspectives that hit me throughout the week.
16/3/10
They Weren’t Joking
I woke up today, refreshed for the first time in six months. Staying in a hotel definitely has its perks! In a strange way, I felt really excited for the day throughout breakfast. I guess it’s not unexpected, but given where we went today, I felt strange in my anticipation…
Our first stop of the day was the small town of Tykocin. Everything about the place, including the entire bus ride there, was entirely surreal. Looking out the window, I watched the world go from modern Warsaw to Fiddler on the Roof. The snow accented the barns and the woods, and with every second, I felt like I was going back in time. I became so enthralled by the scene that it was almost a cruel dose of reality when the snow-covered phone lines glared at me as glowing white crosses.
Tykocin itself is a bit like Corvallis: small town, Center Square, a few big buildings, and a lot of small town houses. It used to be a center of Polish Jewry – 2,000 Jews beginning with the first settlers in the early 1600s. Today, not a single Jew inhabits the vicinity. Why? In 1941, Germans raided Tykocin in Operation Barbarossa. Every Jew was marched out to the forest and murdered by the Einzatzgruppen in shooting pits. Seeing the town was interesting, but it didn’t prepare me for what was to come. Walking down the snowy path to the shooting pits was almost like a terrifying flashback. I could feel the fear surrounding the place, hear the trucks, smell the death. Looking at the shooting pits, I couldn’t cry. I couldn’t cry because I was too busy wrapping my head around the fact that only a few feet below me, 2,000 people met their ends. The sheer mass overwhelmed me. During Mike’s reading, I felt tears coming, but I pushed them back. It was finally when walking back to the bus that I broke. My head swirled with images of frail, naked bodies, and blood bubbling up from the ground. The freezing cold froze the tears on my face, and for a moment, I forgot the deaths occurred 70 years ago.
Treblinka was the first death camp I’ve ever stepped foot in. Oddly, I wasn’t overwhelmed with emotion. Having been destroyed by the Germans, a large memorial is all that remains of the 800,000 who were murdered there. The most shocking thing about Treblinka was finding my family’s stone. I never thought about my family in relation to the Shoa. They left Poland in the 1880s and had nothing to do with WWII. Seeing the “Augustow” stone, however, made me realize that I probably had distant family who DID die in the Shoa. I’ve never felt more connected to my family history, or more grateful for their bravery than I did at that moment.
More than anything, certain aspects of Treblinka made me just plain sick. The fact that people live five minutes away is disgusting. The fact that the Nazis dressed up the station is appalling. The fact that the curtain to the gas chambers was the cover to an Ark is nauseating. I’m angry at humanity, but hoping to find something besides anger in the coming days. Tachanah Treblinka…
17/3/10
Let Our Fate Be a Warning
Today was the hardest day yet. Fully centered on the events of the Shoa, we spent the day outside – depressed and freezing. It’s never all bad – we make each other laugh, and everyone feels like family, but early in the morning, it’s easy to feel lost in one’s desire for warmth.
The morning was spent looking at the Warsaw Ghetto and the events of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Just as the Umschlagplatz is nothing but a memorial, the Ghetto is nothing but a single wall that once belonged to a factory. Nevertheless, its impact is not lost. Amidst the modern apartments, the battered, blood-red wall is a symbol of the unofficial death camp. In the frigid weather, it physically hurt to imagine our situation in a summer dress and on 184 calories per day. Being here, seeing everything, I have such respect and awe for the survivors of ANY part of the Shoa. Truth be told, I don’t think I would have had their will power. I don’t think I would have survived.
The second part of the Ghetto exploration was the Mila 18 memorial. During the uprising, Mila 18 served as the headquarters for the resistance, and eventually, it became their tomb when the Nazis bombed and gassed the last of the fighters. I’ve never been fond of martyrs, but after reading the passages today about Mila 18 and the 93 girls who committed suicide rather than be raped by German soldiers, I have much more respect for the concept. When faced with death, I can’t say I know what I would do, but as someone who appreciates dignity in life, I’d like to think I’d try to keep it in death. One of the things that’s always frustrated me about the Shoa is that even when Jews knew they were being taken to their deaths, hardly any fought back, or even tried to resist. Some ran, but for the supposedly most intelligent race in the world, I guess a part of me sadly expected more. I feel guilty for writing this, but its how I feel. This thought brings me to part three – the Rappaport Memorial.
There are two versions of this famous Shoa sculpture. The original stands in Warsaw, and the copy stands in Yad Vashem. The controversy of this dedication comes in its sides. The front depicts strong, God-like Jews (the resistance fighters) and the back portrays that “weak sheep” of the death camps. Many in Israel are still angry at the survivors of the camps for not fighting back. I’m conflicted about this. On the one hand, I can’t blame anyone in the Shoa for their fate, but on the other hand, I wish more had had the bravery of Mila 18. What would I have done?
Our second stop of the day was the death camp Majdanek. This was a completely different experience than Treblinka. My heart almost stopped when I looked out the window today and saw the full-fledged camp. No memorials. Everything was there. The barbed wire fences, the bunkers, the watch towers, the gas chambers, the crematoriums. Everything. Driving into Majdanek almost felt like we ere being taken there ourselves. Walking through the gas chambers, I instinctually avoided walking under the showers, terrified that they would open after 70 dormant years. The place felt like death. The beds held the original mattresses, the walls had fingernail scratchings on them, the gas chambers still held cans of zyclone B. In a separate barrack, thousands of shoes – big and small – piled high to the ceiling. I broke at the dusty laces. Next to the crematorium was a pile of dirt – or so we thought. On November 3, 1944, the “Harvest Festival” took place, and the Nazis murdered 18,000 in a single day (in reaction to the Sobibor revolt). They buried them in shooting pits for lack of time, and when the local people found the bodies, they burned them. The dirt in front of us was actually the collective ashed of 18,000 people…I couldn’t cry, but I did nearly hurl.
To some extent, I feel guilty for not crying more. After awhile though, I became too shocked/sad to cry. It’s easy to cry from the comfort, but to step into the most evil place on earth, it almost feels as though your soul has temporarily left your body.
After dinner in Lublin, we took a quick trip to the local Yeshiva and learned its story. A much happier experience, it felt amazing to look at a page of Talmud in a place of Jewish learning after a horror-filled day. I’m proud of my people. I’m proud to be Jewish.
18/3/10
There Once Was a World
Today was officially dubbed “ridiculously long bus day”, even thought the Madrichim tried to pretend it wasn’t. Making our way from Lublin to Krakow, we spent 11 hours on the bus with three stops in the midst of our journey. The stops were interesting, but still, bus riding was surprisingly intense.
Our first stop was Lejansk – an old Chassidic town. We learned about the Chassidic movement and Rabbi Eli Melech’s influence in Poland. I was surprisingly fascinated by this stop. Even though I consider myself more spiritual than religious, there was something incredibly moving about being in a past center of Judaism and Jewish life. Listening to ancient prayers and seeing the dedication still given to Reb Melech, I was reminded of just how powerful the idea of Jewish community can be. When I wrote my note to the great Rabbi, I truly felt, more a moment, the same magic of the Kotel. It’s humbling to feel moments of massive connection, and even though I’m not a Chasid, I felt a part of their history – of my history.
Our second stop was hard. After much driving, we reached the small town of Bobovo and the small, surrounding forest. We walked for about half an hour into a small enclave of trees and stumbled upon a moss-covered, cracked gravesite. Neglected and forgotten was the mass grave of the Jews of Bobovo. Beneath our feet, completely nameless, lay the bodies of 700 women and children. Mass graves are much scarier than death camps. At the death camps, the bodies are gone, we know much more of what transpired and who was killed, and everyone remembers. Mass graves are different. The people below us had been forgotten, the Kaddish unsaid, the trees erasing their lives from the rest of the world. 700 people simply evaporated. We read quotes from children before the Shoa. It was chilling to realize that all of them had been us. They fought with their parents, didn’t like their vegetables, stressed over school, loved sports and music. I can’t imagine dealing with what they went through at an age when my biggest concern of the day was what the lunch lady would be serving. Would I have had their strength? Their courage?
Our last stop of the day was in Nove-Sacz – the town where one of my peer’s grandfathers was from. It’s really fascinating that so many of us are from Poland. It feels incredible to be returning after so many generations, and under such different circumstances. I hope my family would be proud.
19/3/10
There is Evil in the Air
Auschwitz-Birkenau is the portal to hell. Majdanek was hard. I’d never seen a real camp before, and it felt chilling, but it was nothing compared to today. Everything about the largest Nazi death camp reeks of evil and death. The air is thick with tortured souls and the fear of millions all those years ago. The sheer length of the walk along the train tracks was enough to stop the world around me. With every step, I heard the rumble of the cattle cars and screams of thousands as they struggled to breathe in the crowded, disease-filled cage. The entrance to Birkenau is huge and intimidating. I giant tower atop a red rectangle hovers eerily, surrounded by a double barbed wire, electric fence. Along the fence, every 20 feet or so, are guard towers. The space is sparse and open, and with a gun aimed at your head from every tower, there is no thought of escape. The tracks run down the middle of the camp, where they meet the selection platform and then continue on to the gas chambers and crematoriums by the forest edge. Tens of barracks sandwich the tracks – men to the right, women to the left. The men’s barracks are almost all destroyed – the wood used to make them having been stolen at the end of the war, but the women’s barracks (made of brick) are almost all fully intact. To the right of the men’s barracks, along the way to the crematoriums, are the remains of “Kanada”, the storage area where prisoners’ belongings were kept (hair, silverware, clothes, etc). There are over 30 large storehouses, and each was supposedly stuffed full in its day. Beyond the small forest edge, the death camp continues its horror. In 1944, the Bastards weren’t being efficient enough, so they extended the camp for the 400,000 Hungarian Jews who were executed in the last three months of the war. I diagrammed the basics on the next page for my own future reference, but I don’t think any of these images will soon leave my mind.
My journey through Birkenau was much harder than I anticipated. Having been told Madjanek was the hardest camp, I woke up thinking the worst was over, and while today would certainly be difficult, I was more than capable of handling it. I was wrong.
Before entering the camp, we went up to the highest guard tower and looked out over the entire complex. It’s genuinely shocking how enormous the camp is. I never learned the milage, but it took us about 20 minutes to walk a straight shot, back to front. Walking through the front entrance was one of the more terrifying experiences in the world. The famous brick archway is actually as scary as it looks in the photos. We walked some distance along the tracks until we arrived at the selection platform. Reading testimony in front of one of the actual cars, I felt tears welling up behind my tired eyes. I reached out and touched the old wood, and it felt tainted. Eerie wind blew across, and for the first time, I felt as though I was back in 1943, being shoved off the car and into lines I didn’t understand. Perhaps I made it through, perhaps I didn’t, but regardless, I had to stand in a line, waiting my turn, watching the fate of my loved ones completely helplessly. 1943 me passed the selection, and cried as 2010 me moved towards the women’s barracks in a coma. The barracks were dark, dusty, dingy, and tiny. It was hard to imagine how anyone slept at night. Between the stench, the cold, and the fear, I fear many might have died from pure exhaustion. The biggest breakdown came in the latrine. Holes in a counter top, the latrine was essentially a giant pit with concrete holes over it. Hearing the stories of the degrading things that occurred involving human excrement, I leaned my head against the window and wept. Death is never dignified, but the least people can do is attempt to make it calm and semi-dignified. The Nazis were not humans. No human can watch another human drowning in his own excrement and laugh. No human can use another’s mouth as a target in piss-aiming practice and to sleep with a clean conscience. More than ever, the question that weighed most heavily on my mind was how could someone do this? How could a living being ever justify taking another life? We left the latrine, but I couldn’t stop crying. The camp was finally real. Birkenau was no longer a place of legend – one that I could attempt to distance myself from. The millions who lost their lives; their souls, were now a part of mine; their stories no longer foreign, but physically real. I cannot pretend to completely understand their suffering, but I can say that the degree to which I felt a part of Birkenau in those moments was almost unbearable. When we were given personal time and asked to write a letter, it took 15 minutes just for my hand to stop shaking, for my tears to stop falling. Eventually, I wrote my letter to Ela Weisberger, a survivor of Terezin and Auschwitz. I didn’t know what to say, so I just spilled all of my conflicted emotion and tried to express how in awe I was of her and other survivors.
Our next stops in the camp were the ruins of the far gas chambers and crematoriums in the back of Birkenau. Thankfully, they’re too destroyed to enter, but affect was strong enough without the added experience. Some how, even though I was still overcome, I couldn’t cry anymore. It felt as though my body physically couldn’t handle any more death, and so rather than mourn, I had instead become too numb to feel. As a result, the rest of the experience passed in a bit of a blur. We walked through Kanada and the warehouses and finally did our ending Tekes by the ash lakes. I finally snapped back to reality on the way out as I slowly began to realize the impact of what had just transpired. Me, a Polish, Jewish girl, had just passed through all of Birkenau and come out without a scratch (at least physically). That realization felt like an extremely satisfying “fuck you” to every Nazi who ever so much as glared at one of my people. That realization also enabled me to eat lunch – something I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to stomach after seeing the camp.
After lunch, we drove a few minutes to the Labor/Concentration Camp of Auschwitz. I feel almost guilty in admitting that after the morning, I felt almost nothing at the college-campus-esque Auschwitz 1. In contrast to Birkenau, Auschwitz has been converted into a museum and is dedicated mainly to presenting hard facts instead of emotional stories. Facts are important, but nearly irrelevant to a group of well-educated Jews who are here in Poland to connect to the Shoa, not to learn its logistics. I appreciate the significance of the museum, especially in relation to Holocaust Deniers, it just didn’t mean very much to me. One room, however, nearly knocked all of us onto the floor. In amongst the cold facts, is the hardest room to enter in Auschwitz. In a giant room are huge glass cases with the contents of the Kanada warehouses – including a case holding two tons of human hair cut from prisoners on their way to the gas chambers. Opposite it was a case of children’s clothes. In some of the other cases were suitcases, tallits, pots, pans, and other items. It shoved the reality of six million into our faces. I kept it together, but the impact was definitely not lost.
Tonight, we tried to recover from the day with Shabbas. Shabbat in Krakow was wonderful. For the first time in seven months, it really felt like Shabbat. We got ready, prayed, stuffed our faces, and sang corny songs. For shul, we went to the Rama Synagogue across from our hotel. Even though it was old-fashioned Orthodox and we were stuck behind a wall, a large part of me still loved the experience! Mike led the service and it was great to follow someone we knew. I couldn’t follow along the entire service, but I knew all the basic songs and prayers. After a long week of Jewish destruction, it felt unbelievable to be included in my heritage.
20/3/10
Shabbas Day in Krakow
Got to sleep in till 10:00!!!!!!!!!!!! It was the most amazing thing the world. =D I missed breakfast, but Judith gave me a granola bar, so kol besder im ani. Around 11, we went on a brisk tour of the Synagogues of the Old Jewish Quarter. Among them, we saw the first Shul in Krakow (built like a castle), the first reform synagogue in Poland (extremely cool), and we took a better look at the Rama Shul and its history (also very cool, but hard to focus on as my stomach was being particularly talkative. The reform shul was the most interesting to me. It was amazing to see the roots of Kol Ami (in a way) from hundreds of years ago, and even though it still held remnants of Orthodoxy, it was shocking how at home I felt there.
After lunch (which was intense!), we went to our processing groups to discuss the issue of God in the Holocaust. We read a passage by Eli Weisel and then the interpretations of God in the Holocaust by various Rabbis. Many claimed the Shoa had to have been some kind of punishment, for Hashem never acts without a reason. I was appalled and strongly disagreed. While I try to see a reason behind everything, I have huge issues with a God that would brutally murder 6 million innocent people as an unclear punishment. Regardless of Zionism, or assimilation, or competing Jewish factions, there is nothing in human history that justifies genocide, no matter what culture or people. I had a hard time with the processing group, but it raised a lot of great questions that are now part of my never-ending food for thought.
In the afternoon, a few of us went on a tour of non-Jewish Krakow. It was awesome! We walked by the place where “Schindler’s List” was filmed, saw the Wawel Castle, heard the legend of the Krakow Dragon, saw the main university, and shopped in the city market square. We even saw dressed-up Polish soldiers – which was oddly unsettling for reasons I don’t understand. Unfortunately, with all the fun, we also got our first dose of physical, directed anti-Semitism. Four of us were walking by a bench of Polish men, and as we tried to pass, they stuck their legs out to trip us. When we walked around and away with annoyed faces, they murmured “Juden” under their breath. I didn’t think anti-Semitism was still that strong, but apparently I was really naïve. The event shook us, but we quickly came to realize it wasn’t worth our trouble and moved on.
Kabbalat Shabbat was beautiful. We sang in a circle outside and felt loopy and happy. Afterwards, we went to the Galicia Jewish museum to see a photography exhibit and hear testimony from a righteous gentile. The photography exhibit was gorgeous. An English photographer, Christopher Schwartz, whose grandfather was Jewish, making Chris “Jewish enough for Adolph Hitler”, put it together. Chris traveled around Poland for months documenting Jewish life before and after the Shoa, mainly focusing on places that people either don’t visit often, or that have been completely forgotten. I was really moved by the photographs of the concentration camp, Belzec. Despite the fact that thousands of Jews were murdered there, all that remains is a plowed-over field. It killed me to think that we spend so much time remembering those who died in the major camps, but there are so many nameless victims that we never think to mention.
I didn’t particularly care for the speaker, but I respect what he’s trying to do. His story was hard to follow, but I highly respect the fact that he helped save Jews in his home and as a member of the Partisans. All in all, a fabulous Shabbas.
21/3/10
The Final Day
Today was back to a 6:00 wake up, =( We stuffed our suitcases, ate breakfast, and started the last day of our Kuma Journey. Our first stop was the cemetery at the Rama Synagogue. Originally disappointed at the idea of going to yet another cemetery, I was pleasantly surprised with the experience. We saw the graves that the local population restored after the Nazis raided the place, the five graves that were left standing, the wall made of the unfixable graves, and heard a remarkable story of Yosele the Meiser. We tried to do rubbings of the graves, but they were very unsuccessful…
Our second stop was an old, abandoned Kibbutz. We learned the story of the devour youth who eventually perished there, and had our final Tekes in Poland. I wasn’t enthralled by the story, but I definitely see the merit in being passionate and action-oriented about an issue or issues. I love being passionate about music/arts awareness, animal conservation, and gay rights back home, and I know that these are issues that I will always continue to devote myself to. I also really loved being a part of the final Tekes. It felt great to be able to be part of the expression of the week – the ups, downs, changes, and things to look forward to. Doing the Tekes forced me to think about just how much I experienced this wekk and how much my perspectives have canged. I went on Kuma with a lot of expectations, worries, and questions. The experience was everything I didn’t expect and more than I could have ever imagined. I laughed, I cried, I hugged, I isolated, I grew, I feared, and I did everything I could to embrace the experience and I still wish I could have learned more. I gained an appreciateion for my family and my history that I could never have gotten in Israel. My faith in God was challenged and wavered, but at the end, I find I feel even more spiritual and connected that I did seven days ago. Kuma is a strange catalyst…
Our final stop was the previous home of one of my peer’s family. It was really incredible to see her reaction to the building where her family lived. I only wish I could have been so lucky. Afterwards, we stopped for lunch at this ridiculous tourist spot and I nearly killed myself on Perokies. Fun and yummy, but painful.
Now, we’re sitting in the airport about to head back to Israel to finish our Journey at the Kotel. I’m excited to go back home. After a week of intensity, it’s going to feel incredible to return to Eretz Yisrael. Until then,
Rachel Smith-Weinstein, Witstenetski, Schoenzeit, Siskind.
Yom Hazikaron Part 2/Yom Ha'atzma'ut!
20/4/10
I'm sitting in my living room writing this at the end of what seems like a mad, continuous day of bipolar holidays. Since all Jewish holidays start the night before, yesterday was the day-section of Yom Hazikaron (the day of mourning for all those who've given their lives for Israel). In the morning, we walked to the Bat-Yam cemetery for the military ceremony for the fallen. It seemed that everyone in Bat Yam knew someone who'd died. The military cemetery was packed, and families surrounded each and every grave stone. Flowers covered the ground and all around, people were dovening and reciting the Yortziet for their loved ones. The people were a sea of blue, white, and the olive of the IDF uniforms. I felt somewhat awkward not knowing any of the fallen soldiers. I felt like I was intruding on the grief of the families somehow. That was in no way true, as many of the families welcomed us to sit and offered to tell the stories of their children, but I still felt very American and out of place.
The official Tekes started at 11:00 when the last siren of the year sounded throughout Israel. Everyone bowed their heads, cars stopped on the highway so their drivers could stand in respect, and the entire world was silent except for the piercing drone. When it stopped, prayers were recited, speeches given, and a chosen IDF tzevet (unit) gave the firing salute before we all erupted in Hatikva (the national anthem). If I hadn't felt Israeli before, that changed after the tekes. Just like Yom Hashoah, Yom Hazikaron connects every Zionistic Jew around the world. Sometimes, it's easy to take Israel for granted, and people of my generation forget that over the years, we've lost hundreds of thousands to protect this tiny snippet of land. Perhaps this yearly revelation is what makes the following day so spectacular.
The second night of Yom Hazikaron is also the transition into Yom Ha'atzma'ut (Independence Day). This is where the country's bipolarism kicks in. In a split second, everyone leaps from deep mourning into intense jubilation! This year was Israel's 62nd birthday! YOM HULEDET SAMEACH YISRAEL!!!!!! Independence Day here is NOTHING like the 4th of July. On the 4th of July, you eat a hot dog, maybe look out your window for a minute to see a firework or two, but you don't lend that much time to thinking about America. Yom Ha'atzma'ut is completely different! In Israel, it's a miracle every year on April 20th. For 62 years, this tiny little country, the size of New Jersey, has fought war after war against all odds, and somehow managed to become one of the most successful countries in the world at the same time. On Independence Day, Israelis celebrate that Israel is still here, that we are all still alive and dedicated to this conflicted country. Last night, the streets of Tel Aviv were packed as street parties raged until the morning. Army bands performed, people cried, and hugged, and kissed complete strangers. Fireworks filled the skies everywhere you looked. IT WAS AMAZING! Definitely my favorite holiday of the year so far.
Tomorrow, things go back to normal, but for now, my friends and I are enjoying the last remnants of the excitement in the air.
All my Love,
Rachel
P.S. It is not okay with me that people keep counting down the days of Year Course on their Facebooks. STOP IT! =(
I'm sitting in my living room writing this at the end of what seems like a mad, continuous day of bipolar holidays. Since all Jewish holidays start the night before, yesterday was the day-section of Yom Hazikaron (the day of mourning for all those who've given their lives for Israel). In the morning, we walked to the Bat-Yam cemetery for the military ceremony for the fallen. It seemed that everyone in Bat Yam knew someone who'd died. The military cemetery was packed, and families surrounded each and every grave stone. Flowers covered the ground and all around, people were dovening and reciting the Yortziet for their loved ones. The people were a sea of blue, white, and the olive of the IDF uniforms. I felt somewhat awkward not knowing any of the fallen soldiers. I felt like I was intruding on the grief of the families somehow. That was in no way true, as many of the families welcomed us to sit and offered to tell the stories of their children, but I still felt very American and out of place.
The official Tekes started at 11:00 when the last siren of the year sounded throughout Israel. Everyone bowed their heads, cars stopped on the highway so their drivers could stand in respect, and the entire world was silent except for the piercing drone. When it stopped, prayers were recited, speeches given, and a chosen IDF tzevet (unit) gave the firing salute before we all erupted in Hatikva (the national anthem). If I hadn't felt Israeli before, that changed after the tekes. Just like Yom Hashoah, Yom Hazikaron connects every Zionistic Jew around the world. Sometimes, it's easy to take Israel for granted, and people of my generation forget that over the years, we've lost hundreds of thousands to protect this tiny snippet of land. Perhaps this yearly revelation is what makes the following day so spectacular.
The second night of Yom Hazikaron is also the transition into Yom Ha'atzma'ut (Independence Day). This is where the country's bipolarism kicks in. In a split second, everyone leaps from deep mourning into intense jubilation! This year was Israel's 62nd birthday! YOM HULEDET SAMEACH YISRAEL!!!!!! Independence Day here is NOTHING like the 4th of July. On the 4th of July, you eat a hot dog, maybe look out your window for a minute to see a firework or two, but you don't lend that much time to thinking about America. Yom Ha'atzma'ut is completely different! In Israel, it's a miracle every year on April 20th. For 62 years, this tiny little country, the size of New Jersey, has fought war after war against all odds, and somehow managed to become one of the most successful countries in the world at the same time. On Independence Day, Israelis celebrate that Israel is still here, that we are all still alive and dedicated to this conflicted country. Last night, the streets of Tel Aviv were packed as street parties raged until the morning. Army bands performed, people cried, and hugged, and kissed complete strangers. Fireworks filled the skies everywhere you looked. IT WAS AMAZING! Definitely my favorite holiday of the year so far.
Tomorrow, things go back to normal, but for now, my friends and I are enjoying the last remnants of the excitement in the air.
All my Love,
Rachel
P.S. It is not okay with me that people keep counting down the days of Year Course on their Facebooks. STOP IT! =(
Sunday, April 18, 2010
Yom Hazikaron Part 1
18/4/10
Yitgadal v'yitkadash shmei raba...
Four words that hang on the breath of every Israeli tonight and tomorrow.
Mourning. It would seem the practice would be second nature to a country of constant grieving. Since even before its Independence in 1948, Jews have suffered unbelievably in these lands. From our exile 2,000 years ago, to the Crusades, to the Entafadas, to the Wars, Jews have covered Israel with their blood, sweat, and tears. Tonight marked the start of Yom Hazikaron - the day of mourning for all those who have given their lives for Israel. Statistically, one in every four Israelis knows someone personally who's died between 1948 and today, but statistics are no more powerful than any other numbers, than even the number 6,000,000. There are families in Israel who've lost multiple children and there are families who've lost none. There are families whose sons have committed suicide and families whose sons have ascended the ranks of the IDF with pride. For every statistic, there is another Israeli story, another face, another history. Bat Yam is one of the smallest cities in Israel, and tonight at the city ceremony, 500 names were read out in remembrance. An easy third of those in attendance tonight were school children. How many of them might be added to this list in 10 years? In 20? In only a few months? With fears of an approaching entafada or perhaps the third Lebanon War, it's impossible to ignore the fact that people my age are enlisting everyday. If I was born here, in my homeland, would I be one of them right now?
Sirens wail, flags flail, and tomorrow marks the saddest day of the year in Israeli culture.
Lizzy and I will write more on our experiences tomorrow,
All my Love,
Rachel
Yizkor
Yitgadal v'yitkadash shmei raba...
Four words that hang on the breath of every Israeli tonight and tomorrow.
Mourning. It would seem the practice would be second nature to a country of constant grieving. Since even before its Independence in 1948, Jews have suffered unbelievably in these lands. From our exile 2,000 years ago, to the Crusades, to the Entafadas, to the Wars, Jews have covered Israel with their blood, sweat, and tears. Tonight marked the start of Yom Hazikaron - the day of mourning for all those who have given their lives for Israel. Statistically, one in every four Israelis knows someone personally who's died between 1948 and today, but statistics are no more powerful than any other numbers, than even the number 6,000,000. There are families in Israel who've lost multiple children and there are families who've lost none. There are families whose sons have committed suicide and families whose sons have ascended the ranks of the IDF with pride. For every statistic, there is another Israeli story, another face, another history. Bat Yam is one of the smallest cities in Israel, and tonight at the city ceremony, 500 names were read out in remembrance. An easy third of those in attendance tonight were school children. How many of them might be added to this list in 10 years? In 20? In only a few months? With fears of an approaching entafada or perhaps the third Lebanon War, it's impossible to ignore the fact that people my age are enlisting everyday. If I was born here, in my homeland, would I be one of them right now?
Sirens wail, flags flail, and tomorrow marks the saddest day of the year in Israeli culture.
Lizzy and I will write more on our experiences tomorrow,
All my Love,
Rachel
Yizkor
Saturday, April 17, 2010
Happenings back at Home!
17/4/10
So it's been about two weeks since I got back to Israel and I've been absolutely horrible about updating my blog, especially since so much has been going on! When I get my Kuma Journal back, I will post a very long update about my trip to Poland also, but for now, let's start back on April 8th...
The day after I returned, all 300 Year Coursers and our Madrichim went on a tiyul and overnight in a Bedouin Camp. My friends and I chose the hard tiyul, thinking it was going to be a "Year Course Stroll", and were pleasantly surprised when we were hauling ourselves up ladders and wading through algae infested waters. It was oddly satisfying to feel sore the next day. After the afternoon hike, all of us met up at the Bedouin Camp and rode camels! My friend Judith and I went twice and named our camel Wilbur. Judith wasn't crazy about him, but I think he was the greatest camel a girl could ask for. Word to the wise, camel riding is one of the most uncomfortable experiences in the world, but it's totally worth it when your camel starts molesting the legs of the riders in front of you. Muahaha! After camel riding, we sat down to an amazing meal of home-made pita bread, humus, kabobs, and rice. It was bliss! That was followed by massive amounts of tea and a long night of sleep in a cozy Bedouin tent. Considering I was delirious for most of this and still remember most of it, I'd say it was a pretty great trip.
The following week, we started back on our normal schedule. In Bat Yam, we have volunteering and classes everyday (except tuesday, which is still siyur day). Thus, having slept for essentially the entire weekend to get over my jetlag, I was fully prepared to make up games with my elementary school students and giggle my way through class as I succeeded in paying attention and creating flawless doodles all while listening attentively to the hideous songs my roommates managed to stick in my head. Yes, it's that time of year, even in Israel. You know, the time when school work flies so far out the window that the idea of doing homework is almost laughable. Yah, it exists 10,000 miles away. You can't outrun it. Darn it! Meanwhile, my lack of interest in school is slowly giving way to more creativity at work! Having still received no lesson plans from my students' teachers, I've taken to inventing a new english game everyday. So far, I have introduced, categorical competitions, madlibs, english tic tac toe, and random ice breakers. It proved incredibly useful to remember that as long as you include a competition aspect in any game, children are likely to immerse themselves in it. It works with 18-year-olds too, but we don't like to admit that. ;)
On a more serious note, April 11th was also Yom Hashoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day). Essentially disregarded in the states, Yom Hashoah is a national holiday in Israel. The country stops, sirens wail, millions recite the Yortzeit (the Jewish memorial prayer), and candles are found in every window. For those of us who went on Kuma, the night held an even more poignant meaning. Yom Hashoah has always been important to me, but after being through a week of intensive immersion in the subject, I found myself deeply affected by the reactions of my fellow year coursers to the idea of remembrance. I ended up writing my Tekkes (ceremony) speech on just that. I think it's better to just post the speech here rather than explain everything:
Recently, several people have mentioned to me the idea of being “over-holocaust-educated”, or numbed, in a way, against repetitive horror. Before going on Kuma, I also entertained the idea of becoming callused because I went looking for closure regarding my own questions about the Shoa. In the last couple of weeks, I’ve come to realize that the idea of closure on the Holocaust is foolish, and indeed, I now have more questions and more conflicts than ever before.
I can’t say that I am immune to numbness. I didn’t cry nearly as much as I thought I would in Poland and I can walk through Yad Vashem without being constantly engaged – even at times complaining of boredom. This idea, however, is extremely unsettling. It’s human to distance oneself from tragedy so as not to be overwhelmed, but distance to the point of apathy threatens to undermine the main goal of Holocaust education – to be knowledgeable ambassadors of a tragedy the world is slowly denying.
On this Yom Hashoah, I’m reminded that it doesn’t matter how many times the story is told, because there will always be someone who needs to hear it. Everytime I feel bored in a Holocaust museum, there will always be someone in the next room in tears from their first time. Tonight, as we light these remembrance candles, I’m seeing them in a new light. It doesn’t matter how many candles we light, or how many history lessons we take. The important thing is to try to find something new, something just as important as the number 6,000,000 with every revisit, and sometimes to accept that the memory of the Shoa can’t be over taught because it can never be fully understood. Maybe thinking we fully understand is the first step to realizing we’re not thinking hard enough.
These ideas stuck with me for all of Yom Hashoah, especially as we sang Hatikva. More than ever before, the Israeli National Anthem brought me to tears because for the first time, I thought of all the people who sang the hopeful tune on their way to the gas chambers, never to see the idea of Jewish state fully realized. I looked around, and many of the people who'd gone to Poland were crying or on the brink of doing so. I don't know that I'll ever be able to make it through another Yom Hashoah without being re-immersed in that surreal week.
On Tuesday, the 13th, a group of us headed north towards Lebanon for a hike through Nachal Ziv. The beautiful, green, rocky, intense trail is part of the Yam al Yam (Sea to Sea) trail that I did in 2008. It winds along a valley and underneath old ruins of the cliff castles of the Crusaders. It was absolutely breathtaking! We climbed over rocks, across streams, through mud, and through pricklies! We also learned stories of how the oak leaf came to be a heart and why the oak tree and the "ela" tree (not sure what it is in English) always grow together. The first is ridiculous and depressing, so I'm skipping it, but the second was beautiful. An old couple gave shelter to a beggar one night and the next morning, he revealed he was an angel and offered them anything. They wished only to spend the rest of eternity together, so he turned one into the "Alon" tree and one into the "Ela" tree. If you look, one never grows without the other.
That afternoon, we stopped in the port, crusader city of Akko. I've been before, but I've never gone into the inner city - the shuk, etc - and it was spectacular. The Kanafe was TO DIE FOR! True, it meant walking past many a sketchy Arab stand, but it was worth it...SO worth it. Afterwards, we walked down to the port, sat on the rocks, and looked out at the perfectly blue water. Times like those are what make me fall more and more in love with this incredible country. The beauty here is simply indescribable and I've never seen anything like it in the states. The sand is soft, the water blue, the greenery everywhere. One can almost understand why so many have killed for a piece of this paradise.
Wednesday and Thursday went by slowly...class may be threatening to kill me soon...
The weekend was fabulous though! Friday morning, Lizzy and I went to Yafo (Jaffa) and shopped around the antique shuk. I bought beautiful presents for you back home, and a couple for myself as well...but that couldn't be helped... ;) We ate lunch at Abu Hassin, which has the best Humus in Israel. I've never eaten so much pita in my life! Afterwards, we ran to Shenkin Street in Tel Aviv where Lizzy got a dread lock and I got a hair wrap. I was too chicken to get the dread. It was so nice to have a day of nothing but fun after a slow, intense week! That night, a bunch of us gathered for a spontaneous barbeque on the beach, and I learned that there is no such thing as "too sandy to eat". Thus, if your hot dog rolls off the grill, you eat your sandy hot dog!
On Saturday, Lizzy and I went over to visit Maya (the Tzofa who lives with us) and her parents. They've become like a second family to us, and it's wonderful to have a house to go to where you feel welcome, you laugh constantly, and the food is always coming. It's also fascinating to talk to Israelis about their perceptions of America. They think we're insane for wanting to make Aliyah, and we think they're insane for insisting that America is nothing but movie stars and glamour. Ah, world images...
That's all for now, but I'll have much more to say soon after Yom Hazikaron and Yom Ha'atzma'ut!
Love,
Rachel
So it's been about two weeks since I got back to Israel and I've been absolutely horrible about updating my blog, especially since so much has been going on! When I get my Kuma Journal back, I will post a very long update about my trip to Poland also, but for now, let's start back on April 8th...
The day after I returned, all 300 Year Coursers and our Madrichim went on a tiyul and overnight in a Bedouin Camp. My friends and I chose the hard tiyul, thinking it was going to be a "Year Course Stroll", and were pleasantly surprised when we were hauling ourselves up ladders and wading through algae infested waters. It was oddly satisfying to feel sore the next day. After the afternoon hike, all of us met up at the Bedouin Camp and rode camels! My friend Judith and I went twice and named our camel Wilbur. Judith wasn't crazy about him, but I think he was the greatest camel a girl could ask for. Word to the wise, camel riding is one of the most uncomfortable experiences in the world, but it's totally worth it when your camel starts molesting the legs of the riders in front of you. Muahaha! After camel riding, we sat down to an amazing meal of home-made pita bread, humus, kabobs, and rice. It was bliss! That was followed by massive amounts of tea and a long night of sleep in a cozy Bedouin tent. Considering I was delirious for most of this and still remember most of it, I'd say it was a pretty great trip.
The following week, we started back on our normal schedule. In Bat Yam, we have volunteering and classes everyday (except tuesday, which is still siyur day). Thus, having slept for essentially the entire weekend to get over my jetlag, I was fully prepared to make up games with my elementary school students and giggle my way through class as I succeeded in paying attention and creating flawless doodles all while listening attentively to the hideous songs my roommates managed to stick in my head. Yes, it's that time of year, even in Israel. You know, the time when school work flies so far out the window that the idea of doing homework is almost laughable. Yah, it exists 10,000 miles away. You can't outrun it. Darn it! Meanwhile, my lack of interest in school is slowly giving way to more creativity at work! Having still received no lesson plans from my students' teachers, I've taken to inventing a new english game everyday. So far, I have introduced, categorical competitions, madlibs, english tic tac toe, and random ice breakers. It proved incredibly useful to remember that as long as you include a competition aspect in any game, children are likely to immerse themselves in it. It works with 18-year-olds too, but we don't like to admit that. ;)
On a more serious note, April 11th was also Yom Hashoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day). Essentially disregarded in the states, Yom Hashoah is a national holiday in Israel. The country stops, sirens wail, millions recite the Yortzeit (the Jewish memorial prayer), and candles are found in every window. For those of us who went on Kuma, the night held an even more poignant meaning. Yom Hashoah has always been important to me, but after being through a week of intensive immersion in the subject, I found myself deeply affected by the reactions of my fellow year coursers to the idea of remembrance. I ended up writing my Tekkes (ceremony) speech on just that. I think it's better to just post the speech here rather than explain everything:
Recently, several people have mentioned to me the idea of being “over-holocaust-educated”, or numbed, in a way, against repetitive horror. Before going on Kuma, I also entertained the idea of becoming callused because I went looking for closure regarding my own questions about the Shoa. In the last couple of weeks, I’ve come to realize that the idea of closure on the Holocaust is foolish, and indeed, I now have more questions and more conflicts than ever before.
I can’t say that I am immune to numbness. I didn’t cry nearly as much as I thought I would in Poland and I can walk through Yad Vashem without being constantly engaged – even at times complaining of boredom. This idea, however, is extremely unsettling. It’s human to distance oneself from tragedy so as not to be overwhelmed, but distance to the point of apathy threatens to undermine the main goal of Holocaust education – to be knowledgeable ambassadors of a tragedy the world is slowly denying.
On this Yom Hashoah, I’m reminded that it doesn’t matter how many times the story is told, because there will always be someone who needs to hear it. Everytime I feel bored in a Holocaust museum, there will always be someone in the next room in tears from their first time. Tonight, as we light these remembrance candles, I’m seeing them in a new light. It doesn’t matter how many candles we light, or how many history lessons we take. The important thing is to try to find something new, something just as important as the number 6,000,000 with every revisit, and sometimes to accept that the memory of the Shoa can’t be over taught because it can never be fully understood. Maybe thinking we fully understand is the first step to realizing we’re not thinking hard enough.
These ideas stuck with me for all of Yom Hashoah, especially as we sang Hatikva. More than ever before, the Israeli National Anthem brought me to tears because for the first time, I thought of all the people who sang the hopeful tune on their way to the gas chambers, never to see the idea of Jewish state fully realized. I looked around, and many of the people who'd gone to Poland were crying or on the brink of doing so. I don't know that I'll ever be able to make it through another Yom Hashoah without being re-immersed in that surreal week.
On Tuesday, the 13th, a group of us headed north towards Lebanon for a hike through Nachal Ziv. The beautiful, green, rocky, intense trail is part of the Yam al Yam (Sea to Sea) trail that I did in 2008. It winds along a valley and underneath old ruins of the cliff castles of the Crusaders. It was absolutely breathtaking! We climbed over rocks, across streams, through mud, and through pricklies! We also learned stories of how the oak leaf came to be a heart and why the oak tree and the "ela" tree (not sure what it is in English) always grow together. The first is ridiculous and depressing, so I'm skipping it, but the second was beautiful. An old couple gave shelter to a beggar one night and the next morning, he revealed he was an angel and offered them anything. They wished only to spend the rest of eternity together, so he turned one into the "Alon" tree and one into the "Ela" tree. If you look, one never grows without the other.
That afternoon, we stopped in the port, crusader city of Akko. I've been before, but I've never gone into the inner city - the shuk, etc - and it was spectacular. The Kanafe was TO DIE FOR! True, it meant walking past many a sketchy Arab stand, but it was worth it...SO worth it. Afterwards, we walked down to the port, sat on the rocks, and looked out at the perfectly blue water. Times like those are what make me fall more and more in love with this incredible country. The beauty here is simply indescribable and I've never seen anything like it in the states. The sand is soft, the water blue, the greenery everywhere. One can almost understand why so many have killed for a piece of this paradise.
Wednesday and Thursday went by slowly...class may be threatening to kill me soon...
The weekend was fabulous though! Friday morning, Lizzy and I went to Yafo (Jaffa) and shopped around the antique shuk. I bought beautiful presents for you back home, and a couple for myself as well...but that couldn't be helped... ;) We ate lunch at Abu Hassin, which has the best Humus in Israel. I've never eaten so much pita in my life! Afterwards, we ran to Shenkin Street in Tel Aviv where Lizzy got a dread lock and I got a hair wrap. I was too chicken to get the dread. It was so nice to have a day of nothing but fun after a slow, intense week! That night, a bunch of us gathered for a spontaneous barbeque on the beach, and I learned that there is no such thing as "too sandy to eat". Thus, if your hot dog rolls off the grill, you eat your sandy hot dog!
On Saturday, Lizzy and I went over to visit Maya (the Tzofa who lives with us) and her parents. They've become like a second family to us, and it's wonderful to have a house to go to where you feel welcome, you laugh constantly, and the food is always coming. It's also fascinating to talk to Israelis about their perceptions of America. They think we're insane for wanting to make Aliyah, and we think they're insane for insisting that America is nothing but movie stars and glamour. Ah, world images...
That's all for now, but I'll have much more to say soon after Yom Hazikaron and Yom Ha'atzma'ut!
Love,
Rachel
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
The American Culture Shock
7/4/10
What the hell just happened? A week ago, I was ready to walk back to the states, and now, I can’t understand whatever made me want to leave Israel. Most puzzling of all, actually, is not that I miss Israel, but that I don’t really miss anywhere. I don’t know where to call home now because nowhere truly feels like home anymore. I lost my love of the states a long time ago, but I didn’t think I would ever become as apathetic about the rest of the world. I don’t think I am, but my current feelings are so conflicted that it seems as though I’m presently unable to render affectionate feelings unto one particular place. It’s highly unsettling to not belong anywhere. I’m not ready to belong in Israel, but I no longer belong in America. I want to belong at Oberlin next year, but I’m terrified of post-year-course-trauma and the horrible feelings of displacement that past participants have described during their collegial years. I know I’ll eventually adjust, as I always do, as everyone always does, but I can’t shake the itch that something is now so drastically different about me that I may never be able to fully acclimate myself to US behavior ever again. Here’s how break went down…
I flew back from Poland early on the 22nd, slept for most of the day, shlepped back to Jerusalem on the 23rd for the Hadassah interview I mentioned previously (different post on that), schlepped back to Bat Yam, threw clothes into a couple bags in unparalleled disarray, caught a few hours of sleep, hopped in a taxi with my friend Rebecca at 4am on the 24th, wandered through Ben Gurion airport (thank God for travel buddies!), finally got on the plane at 9am, flew to London (Heathrow Airport can go *$%^ itself), relaxed at the bar at TGIFs, flew to JFK on one of the longest flights of my life, ran off the plane, hugged my grandparents, drove to my mom’s apartment, threw my stuff down, snuggled with my kitten, and died. That was travel day.
The next morning, the confusion began. I awoke on the 25th to absolute quiet and had no idea where I was. After seven months of sleeping through noise in the morning, I didn’t understand the lack of chaos around me. I didn’t understand why my bed was so big, or why something fuzzy was nuzzling me, or why I could smell coffee before I was fully conscious. In an odd way, it almost felt like waking up in a five star hotel, which, in essence, is where my conflictions began. The hardest thing about this whole week was how easy everything seemed – or perhaps, even, how fake. I can’t say that seven months completely erased my American mentality, but I didn’t realize just how much I’d strayed from my old environment until I stepped off the plane in New York. Even just driving home, the world looked vacant. Walking through the terminal, instead of hearing the engaging arguments about everything from politics to the prices of vegetables, there were girls complaining about how they only had three pairs of sunglasses. Looking down at my luggage, I felt guilty for complaining that I had so many things to pack. Did I really come from a world where it’s socially acceptable to complain about having too much? Where the quantity of “too little” is really more than most people dream of in a lifetime? When I woke up to the smell of coffee, I was terrified by the part of me that reverted into my old mindset of “oh good, there’s coffee”. No “thanks mom!”, no “oh, I’ll make coffee”. Was I really the girl who seven months ago didn’t even want to bring her dishes to the sink? Who didn’t know how to do laundry? Who never gave a second thought to how much money her parents were spending on her? Was I really that person?
My time in NYC proved fun, scary, and invigorating. So many things sent my mind awhirlin’! My first real day back, Julie took me to the Natural History Museum and I got a NY hotdog from a street vendor (the only way to get hotdogs in NYC). I just have to say, it doesn’t matter how many times I go, the Natural History Museum never gets old. Even though I’ve seen some of the exhibits over 10 times, I still marvel at all the geeky facts one can soak up in a day within those majestic walls. The new live reptile exhibit was AMAZING! I spent a good 15-20 minutes finding all the camouflaged geckos in the Gecko Dome… More than momentary enjoyment though, the thing the NH museum does best is reaffirm my love of biology. I’ve found that every time I flip-flop back and forth between music and science, I have to reassure myself that I still love both of them. Going to the theatre accomplishes the first, and going to the NH Museum accomplishes the second. I suppose I shouldn’t need to reassure myself of either passion, but it can get confusing at times (not going into this saga again, however…).
The next major event, although not too thought provoking, happened on the 27th. Turns out, all these years of being a bad Jew finally caught up with me and now, I’m allergic to shellfish. One meal at Red Lobster and I ended up costing us our closing night theatre tickets and earning Julie and I a stressful (and drugged up) night in the ER. Not fun. At all. Needless to say, I won’t be having shrimp again, although I must admit it was slightly exciting to have my first ER experience! That’s sad…
The next night, we made up for our theatre loss with cheap tickets to “Sondheim on Sondheim”. Essentially, this was my equivalent of the NHM for the music half of my divided self. Some people are just blessed with a type of genius that is unparalleled in any other being. Stephen Sondheim is one of those people. Hands down. The night was a night of amazing music, tear-jerking performances, buckets of laughs, and the amazing chance to meet BARBARA COOK! For those who don’t know who Barbara Cook is, you have some serious googling to do. Alright, I suppose reading this paragraph, America does have some perks…
On the 29th, I braved my first Siskind family seder since 1997. It was slightly terrifying, very yummy, but ultimately, socially disappointing. I enjoyed the company of most of the people there (my cousins, etc), but having not grown up amongst most of my family, I didn’t feel the connection and nostalgia to the whole event that my mom and grandmother did. It makes sense that I would feel this way since almost all of my family members are strangers to me, but I can’t help but feel some sting of regret/guilt that I simply don’t feel the need to be close with my relatives. I love the ones I grew up with (parents, grandparents, and some cousins), but other than that, I’m thrilled to have my surrogate family of tight-knit friends and mentors who I love as if they were my flesh and blood. Perhaps that’s because of growing up with only one biological parent and accepting early on that love has little to do with genetics, but for whatever reason, I’m happy to have the family that I have, and even though it may seem sad that I’m basically forsaking the majority of my blood-relatives, I think for me, it’s an okay thing to do. That’s definitely a decision made by YC Rachel. =D
After a few hours of reflection the next day, it was off to Los Angeles. By now, I’m wondering if half my ramblings are the result of the tremendous amounts of flight radiation I’ve received in the last two weeks…hmm. Going back to Los Angeles was surreal. Stepping off the plane, a part of me smelled the L.A. air and squealed with delight and another part of me went “what the ^&*% am I doing back here?”. By the end of the week, after days of visiting old places, meeting with dear friends, and just having a moment back in my old life, I realized that while it was fun to visit L.A., I don’t miss it at all now. I miss the people dearly still, and I can’t wait to see my friends again in two months, but I really don’t care about going back to L.A. Is that bad? I know that when I was there, I said I missed L.A. terribly, but after feeling the elated feeling of home flying over Tel Aviv today, I think my missing was more memory than present. I’m not sure how I feel about this yet. I don’t know if I’m ready to say that Israel is home yet. Is it even home? Sitting in my apartment in Bat Yam now, and listening to the sounds of crazy Russian and Hebrew arguments outside, I feel more at home than sitting in NYC or LA. For now though, I’m going to try not to dwell on it. I still have two more months in this amazing country, and I don’t want to spend too much of it pondering about spring break. Until tomorrow!
What the hell just happened? A week ago, I was ready to walk back to the states, and now, I can’t understand whatever made me want to leave Israel. Most puzzling of all, actually, is not that I miss Israel, but that I don’t really miss anywhere. I don’t know where to call home now because nowhere truly feels like home anymore. I lost my love of the states a long time ago, but I didn’t think I would ever become as apathetic about the rest of the world. I don’t think I am, but my current feelings are so conflicted that it seems as though I’m presently unable to render affectionate feelings unto one particular place. It’s highly unsettling to not belong anywhere. I’m not ready to belong in Israel, but I no longer belong in America. I want to belong at Oberlin next year, but I’m terrified of post-year-course-trauma and the horrible feelings of displacement that past participants have described during their collegial years. I know I’ll eventually adjust, as I always do, as everyone always does, but I can’t shake the itch that something is now so drastically different about me that I may never be able to fully acclimate myself to US behavior ever again. Here’s how break went down…
I flew back from Poland early on the 22nd, slept for most of the day, shlepped back to Jerusalem on the 23rd for the Hadassah interview I mentioned previously (different post on that), schlepped back to Bat Yam, threw clothes into a couple bags in unparalleled disarray, caught a few hours of sleep, hopped in a taxi with my friend Rebecca at 4am on the 24th, wandered through Ben Gurion airport (thank God for travel buddies!), finally got on the plane at 9am, flew to London (Heathrow Airport can go *$%^ itself), relaxed at the bar at TGIFs, flew to JFK on one of the longest flights of my life, ran off the plane, hugged my grandparents, drove to my mom’s apartment, threw my stuff down, snuggled with my kitten, and died. That was travel day.
The next morning, the confusion began. I awoke on the 25th to absolute quiet and had no idea where I was. After seven months of sleeping through noise in the morning, I didn’t understand the lack of chaos around me. I didn’t understand why my bed was so big, or why something fuzzy was nuzzling me, or why I could smell coffee before I was fully conscious. In an odd way, it almost felt like waking up in a five star hotel, which, in essence, is where my conflictions began. The hardest thing about this whole week was how easy everything seemed – or perhaps, even, how fake. I can’t say that seven months completely erased my American mentality, but I didn’t realize just how much I’d strayed from my old environment until I stepped off the plane in New York. Even just driving home, the world looked vacant. Walking through the terminal, instead of hearing the engaging arguments about everything from politics to the prices of vegetables, there were girls complaining about how they only had three pairs of sunglasses. Looking down at my luggage, I felt guilty for complaining that I had so many things to pack. Did I really come from a world where it’s socially acceptable to complain about having too much? Where the quantity of “too little” is really more than most people dream of in a lifetime? When I woke up to the smell of coffee, I was terrified by the part of me that reverted into my old mindset of “oh good, there’s coffee”. No “thanks mom!”, no “oh, I’ll make coffee”. Was I really the girl who seven months ago didn’t even want to bring her dishes to the sink? Who didn’t know how to do laundry? Who never gave a second thought to how much money her parents were spending on her? Was I really that person?
My time in NYC proved fun, scary, and invigorating. So many things sent my mind awhirlin’! My first real day back, Julie took me to the Natural History Museum and I got a NY hotdog from a street vendor (the only way to get hotdogs in NYC). I just have to say, it doesn’t matter how many times I go, the Natural History Museum never gets old. Even though I’ve seen some of the exhibits over 10 times, I still marvel at all the geeky facts one can soak up in a day within those majestic walls. The new live reptile exhibit was AMAZING! I spent a good 15-20 minutes finding all the camouflaged geckos in the Gecko Dome… More than momentary enjoyment though, the thing the NH museum does best is reaffirm my love of biology. I’ve found that every time I flip-flop back and forth between music and science, I have to reassure myself that I still love both of them. Going to the theatre accomplishes the first, and going to the NH Museum accomplishes the second. I suppose I shouldn’t need to reassure myself of either passion, but it can get confusing at times (not going into this saga again, however…).
The next major event, although not too thought provoking, happened on the 27th. Turns out, all these years of being a bad Jew finally caught up with me and now, I’m allergic to shellfish. One meal at Red Lobster and I ended up costing us our closing night theatre tickets and earning Julie and I a stressful (and drugged up) night in the ER. Not fun. At all. Needless to say, I won’t be having shrimp again, although I must admit it was slightly exciting to have my first ER experience! That’s sad…
The next night, we made up for our theatre loss with cheap tickets to “Sondheim on Sondheim”. Essentially, this was my equivalent of the NHM for the music half of my divided self. Some people are just blessed with a type of genius that is unparalleled in any other being. Stephen Sondheim is one of those people. Hands down. The night was a night of amazing music, tear-jerking performances, buckets of laughs, and the amazing chance to meet BARBARA COOK! For those who don’t know who Barbara Cook is, you have some serious googling to do. Alright, I suppose reading this paragraph, America does have some perks…
On the 29th, I braved my first Siskind family seder since 1997. It was slightly terrifying, very yummy, but ultimately, socially disappointing. I enjoyed the company of most of the people there (my cousins, etc), but having not grown up amongst most of my family, I didn’t feel the connection and nostalgia to the whole event that my mom and grandmother did. It makes sense that I would feel this way since almost all of my family members are strangers to me, but I can’t help but feel some sting of regret/guilt that I simply don’t feel the need to be close with my relatives. I love the ones I grew up with (parents, grandparents, and some cousins), but other than that, I’m thrilled to have my surrogate family of tight-knit friends and mentors who I love as if they were my flesh and blood. Perhaps that’s because of growing up with only one biological parent and accepting early on that love has little to do with genetics, but for whatever reason, I’m happy to have the family that I have, and even though it may seem sad that I’m basically forsaking the majority of my blood-relatives, I think for me, it’s an okay thing to do. That’s definitely a decision made by YC Rachel. =D
After a few hours of reflection the next day, it was off to Los Angeles. By now, I’m wondering if half my ramblings are the result of the tremendous amounts of flight radiation I’ve received in the last two weeks…hmm. Going back to Los Angeles was surreal. Stepping off the plane, a part of me smelled the L.A. air and squealed with delight and another part of me went “what the ^&*% am I doing back here?”. By the end of the week, after days of visiting old places, meeting with dear friends, and just having a moment back in my old life, I realized that while it was fun to visit L.A., I don’t miss it at all now. I miss the people dearly still, and I can’t wait to see my friends again in two months, but I really don’t care about going back to L.A. Is that bad? I know that when I was there, I said I missed L.A. terribly, but after feeling the elated feeling of home flying over Tel Aviv today, I think my missing was more memory than present. I’m not sure how I feel about this yet. I don’t know if I’m ready to say that Israel is home yet. Is it even home? Sitting in my apartment in Bat Yam now, and listening to the sounds of crazy Russian and Hebrew arguments outside, I feel more at home than sitting in NYC or LA. For now though, I’m going to try not to dwell on it. I still have two more months in this amazing country, and I don’t want to spend too much of it pondering about spring break. Until tomorrow!
Thursday, March 11, 2010
A full day and wonderings about volunteering
11/3/10
Today, I reluctantly dragged myself out of bed and sleep walked to volunteering. I've been overly lethargic lately for reasons I don't understand, but I'm hoping that will go away soon. My volunteering partner had a doctor's appointment, so I was alone with the kids today. I didn't feel out of my element, having been in a classroom situation with elementary students for several years back home, but I still found myself frustrated. It's very difficult to be an out-of-class tutor when you have no idea what's going on in-class, no one seems to want to explain to you what's going on in-class, you get new kids every 45 minutes, and you get groups of three kids who are all at drastically different levels. It's hard. There's just no other way to describe it. I understand that the levels issue is an issue for the teachers as well, but with all the factors bunching up together, it's almost impossible to find a way to reach all the pupils in a fun and effective way. Does anyone have any suggestions? Please let me know! I really want to make this volunteering placement work... It did make my day to get massive amounts of hugs from my last group of girls though. I love little kids! So cute!
We started Ulpan today as well. I'm slightly peeved at the way the class is run, but I suppose there's never a perfect language class. Some things are too fast, some things are too slow, and for most of the class, I'm perfecting my doodling skills, but hey, if I can learn something in the two and half hours I'm there, I guess it's worth it. =D
After class, my roommates and I discovered that going grocery shopping on a thursday night is a stupid, stupid, stupid idea. The day before Shabbas is RIDICULOUS! Imagine Costco on black friday..... Needless to say, we made it out alive, and we managed to get free soy pudding, but we are NEVER repeating this experience...EVER!
I'm leaving for Kuma this upcoming Sunday night. I'll have a lot to say on that in a couple days when it fully sinks in. In the meantime, it's the weekend, and I'm excited for street fairs, sleep, beach, and food at my Scout's family's house!
Endless Love,
Rachel
Today, I reluctantly dragged myself out of bed and sleep walked to volunteering. I've been overly lethargic lately for reasons I don't understand, but I'm hoping that will go away soon. My volunteering partner had a doctor's appointment, so I was alone with the kids today. I didn't feel out of my element, having been in a classroom situation with elementary students for several years back home, but I still found myself frustrated. It's very difficult to be an out-of-class tutor when you have no idea what's going on in-class, no one seems to want to explain to you what's going on in-class, you get new kids every 45 minutes, and you get groups of three kids who are all at drastically different levels. It's hard. There's just no other way to describe it. I understand that the levels issue is an issue for the teachers as well, but with all the factors bunching up together, it's almost impossible to find a way to reach all the pupils in a fun and effective way. Does anyone have any suggestions? Please let me know! I really want to make this volunteering placement work... It did make my day to get massive amounts of hugs from my last group of girls though. I love little kids! So cute!
We started Ulpan today as well. I'm slightly peeved at the way the class is run, but I suppose there's never a perfect language class. Some things are too fast, some things are too slow, and for most of the class, I'm perfecting my doodling skills, but hey, if I can learn something in the two and half hours I'm there, I guess it's worth it. =D
After class, my roommates and I discovered that going grocery shopping on a thursday night is a stupid, stupid, stupid idea. The day before Shabbas is RIDICULOUS! Imagine Costco on black friday..... Needless to say, we made it out alive, and we managed to get free soy pudding, but we are NEVER repeating this experience...EVER!
I'm leaving for Kuma this upcoming Sunday night. I'll have a lot to say on that in a couple days when it fully sinks in. In the meantime, it's the weekend, and I'm excited for street fairs, sleep, beach, and food at my Scout's family's house!
Endless Love,
Rachel
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