The Ghetto:
It's not their fault they live here in the old Jewish Ghetto--they were forced to move here under communism and now they don't have the resources to leave. They don't want to live in these haunted tenements either...
The Nazis were especially torturous toward religious people, chopping off their beards and lighting them on fire, forcing them to sing or dance.
The Nazis staged a documentary in the Ghetto that showed the Jews as an immoral people, but the original tapes were later found. They show that the Jews set up hospitals, soup kitchens, schools, and cultural centers.
Polish Uprising Museum.
The museum felt disorganized and overwhelming. It was visually overstimulating and confusing. I think I got a general sense that I didn't have before that the Polish people really suffered during WWII. There were entire cities that were simply leveled to the ground by the Germans. While in the museum, although I felt for the Polish people, I kept looking for things relating to Jews. There is something different about what happened to the Jews. Maybe it's because it was on a larger scale but I don't think that's it. I think it's the dehumanization and deindividualization, systematic humiliation and degradation. I also feel a deeper connection to what happened to the Jews, for obvious reasons. I wonder if the non-Jews feel the same disconnect toward the Holocaust that I feel toward the Polish uprising.
We are going to be leaving Warsaw soon. I just looked at a map and realized I never learned any street names here.
Jerusalem. July 12, 2011.
Prayer doesn't change things. Prayer changes people. People change things.
חיוך עושה קסמים––a smile makes magic
Quotes from Adjusting Sights by Haim Sabato:
We'll wait for the next bus. That's the story of our lives. It's the story of everyone's life. There'll be another bus. There's bound to be. We'll get there.
The faith of today is not the faith of yesterday.
From this we learn there are different kinds of good deeds. There are those that everyone knows about, performed by great men at great moments, and there are those that seem trivial, performed by the ordinary moments of ordinary days. And it's the second kind that earn us a place in paradise.
Wherefore doth a living man complain?
Be glad you're alive.
Not all times and days are the same. There are long days and short days, full times and empty ones. There are hours that go by like years and years that pass like hours, interminable moments and lifetimes like a fleeting dream.
Yad Vashem, The Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem.
The tour guide feels a lot more natural here. I understand her accent; she understands what it means to be Jewish.
This morning we were in Arad and put a mechitzah (a wall that divides men and women) during Shacharit (the morning prayer service). We put the Torahs on the women's side, a bold move. The girls led the service and read Torah. I've never seen the girls so into it and the boys so out of it. Everyone is up in arms. I'm still thinking about how I can explain to them about the beauty of separated praying. I can't find the words though. #modernfeministtraditionaljewproblems
There is something about the Shoah (the Holocaust) that makes me want to find the meaning in my life and the importance in what I'm doing.
On the bus from Arad to Jerusalem today, I taught Yuval a song and he taught me a new tune to שבחי ירושלים. Then we started talking about Arabs and Palestinians and Jews and Israelis. He showed me a piece by Shai Agnon about the Mourner's Kaddish. The piece was nice but it wasn't the universal-feel-good prayer that I'm partial to. I told Yuval and that led to a conversation about Cain and Abel and creation and morality vs. altruism. He said, "their morality shouldn't affect our morality," on the topic of Gilad Shalit.
A country is not just what it does; it is also what it tolerates --Kurt Tucholsky
I am freedom's festival, the last and best
Come, take your rest.
--The Emperor of Atlantis
I just teared up out of happiness (?) when I heard the story of women who shared recipes at night in the barracks of concentration camps and kept records in a kosher book and a non kosher book. One woman was able to keep the books and donated the kosher cookbook to Yad Vashem and through this project she was reconnected with one of those women.
What would you do to hold onto your humanity?
This reminds me of a story I heard many years ago about a man who was kept prisoner for years in a windowless room. To keep himself from going mad, he recited facts about wines. He just went over these facts again and again to keep his mind on something. I was worried at the time; I don't have anything memorized. I don't know recipes except for matzah brei. I can't remember song lyrics in order. I know bits and pieces of the periodic table, Bernoulli's equation, and half of a Shakepeare sonnet. Would that be enough?
A lot of people got married and had babies after the war as soon as they could. How! Would I have wanted that?
A lot of kids in my group gave donations at the end of the museum tour and wrote in the guest book. Something means more to me when I see that it means something to them.
Har Herzl, the national cemetery.
The טקס (ceremony) is taking place at the new section. The ground is waiting for new graves. This is the worst part of this whole place. When I think of Michael Levin's grave, I think of my friends who are in the army now. They're just little kids. I don't want this piece of land to be here. I wish it wasn't waiting so patiently.
Overlook of Syria.
Yom Kippur War: what kind of country raises her children to emerge from a safe place and put themselves into mortal danger? To jump on a grenade to save their friends?
Tzfat.
"Israel is not only a land--it is a state of mind." the Kabbalist at the Yemenite cafe
Jerusalem.
רק פה--A man came up to Yaakov, our bus driver while we were stopped at a red light to get a light for his cigarette.
I took one of the girls in my group to the hospital for an allergic reaction. We were treated by a short version of Gandalf wearing a large black kippah. He was an old, religious Jew and a most compassionate doctor. He said, "Thanks be to God that God gave wisdom to man that he may invent medicine."
For what it's worth, these posts about my trip this summer are dedicated to the members of Subgroup Awesome, who helped me process, held my hand, and inspired me to think and care deeply about each moment of each day. Thank you, I love you.
