The March of the Living

We woke up this morning, packed our luggage, checked out of hotel, and loaded onto the busses. Today was the March of the Living. I expected it to be a fun time, showing our Jewish pride. I didn't really think of it as my main point of sadness and understanding. I thought wrong. When we got there, our group was happy, proud, excited. Holding Israeli flags and wearing our blue jackets we were ready to march. Our group walked together from the parking lot into the camp to gather by our starting point. I walked right by the gas chambers that brought tears to my eyes yesterday. I walked to our meeting point in between barracks 4 and 5. I wasn't sad. I interacted with hundreds of people from different delegations. I traded pins with people from all over (I got this awesome hand beaded pin of the South African flag from a very nice man from there in exchange for my light-up USA pin). We were meeting people, laughing with people. This was all joy. The weather was beautiful and we practically forgot where we were. We ignored that on our way to this starting point we passed the gas chamber where hundreds of thousands of our ancestors breathed their last breaths. The ceremony was about to begin, so, still happy, we lined up arm in arm in rows of 6. Delegations representing 40 different countries did the same. It was weird to think that there were 10,000 people filling the alleys in Auschwitz I, however, at its peak, Auschwitz I housed over 20,000 people. I escaped from my thoughts and listened. I really expected something so different for the beginning of the March. I thought I would be upset. I thought this moment would be 10,000 people in mourning. It wasn't. But then the ceremony began, about 10,000 people (both Jewish and non-Jews) began to quiet down and listen to the beginning of the walk. The man on the speaker explained how the Arbet Macht Frei arch was stolen around 6 months ago and defaced by people trying to delete our history and the stories behind it. We stood there today, however, so that no one deletes that history. So that we really do Never forget. To start the March, they blew a shofar. A loud, strong, powerful shofar sound. The whispers from when the man was speaking halted. You could hear a pin drop in the silence. It was eerie. 10,000 people in Auschwitz all silent. We took one step forward as the group started our walk. After that step a brisk wind blew across the camp. I had chills as I imagined this wind as the six million there with us. The silence periodically ended and out attempts at a silent protest was not 100% successful, but it made a point. Our March was a 3km (1.5 miles about) trek between Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II - Birkenau. We walked down the street connecting the two camps and made a turn. The sea of people made their way up a bridge over a set of train tracks. I looked in front of me, I looked behind me, there were people as far as I could see. It was a sight of pride that all of these people were there to survive and carry on the stories of what we saw and did. Still, though, we were not sad. There was too much talking and joking and laughing, I think, that took away from somber mood of the March. We continued down the road with 10,000 people and made our way into Birkenau. It didn't hit us that we were walking into Birkenau on the path of a death march where 250,000 people died and we were living. Our group was allowed to split up and experience this ceremony with just a few people.

The next hour was the most unexpectedly emotional and remarkable hour of my life. Myself and 3 other friends, Hannah, Shelby, and Jacob walked through the camp together. When we were in Birkenau yesterday, I didn't understand it; today I did. Each person was given a small wooden paddle when we got off the bus and wrote messages on them. I wrote "6 million. Never forget. Never again." The 4 of us walked to the center of the camp to the selection are to place our paddles on the train tracks. The weather was nice but the wind was very strong. I was sitting on the ground to light a candle in remembrance. The wind would not let me light it. I had Jacob come lean over to help block the wind so I could light it. Two other boys who I have never seen before and probably will never see also leaded over to help light my match. Then a survivor, I think his name was Howard, his aged hands grabbed mine as together we tried to light this candle. The group of us, I think 7 strangers in total, joined together to recite the Mourner's Kaddish. It was beautiful. The candle would not light but I left it there, light in my heart. The mood of the day really changed. It went from this joyous mood the somber mood that I expected to feel a while earlier. As the four of us walked through the camp holding hands in silence, we listened to the loud speaker where the names of the 1.5 million children who died in the holocaust were recited. It put names to the stories that were written on the exact ground I was walking on. Yesterday we didn't get the chance to experience Auschwitz II - Birkenau so we decided to walk around. We went to a pile of rubles. This wasn't just any pile, though. We stood in front of Gas Chamber and Crematorium I. The reason it was pile of rubles was because at the end of the war, when the Nazis were burning the buildings trying to destroy their evidence, they bombed the gas chambers as well. They were so ashamed of the atrocities that occurred in this building. The hole in the ground in front of us was massive. While the roof was completely fallen in, the ground structure was still visible. The stairs leading down were 2 feet a head of me. The room they striped in, hoping for a shower was right there. I saw the destroyed metal pipes that produced gas to kill over a million of my ancestors. I saw the crematorium where their lifeless bodies were incinerated. I saw it and I cried. I saw it and I was hurt. Think of how many more people could have gathered together if there was no reason to gather. I know that doesn't make sense, but think of what the Jewish people would be today if not for this gas chamber. I saw this on one of the paddles and really thought about it, if not for the one Jew that was killed six million times, who would the Jewish people be today. It was not six million Jews who were killed. It was a mother and a father and a sister and a husband and a friend and a son killed on and on until it summed to six million Jewish men and women and children and five million more of g-d's children. The loud speaker told us that the ceremony was going to begin shortly. We walked in silence up the steps on the monument that was built towards the end of the camp. There were so many people that it was like a rock concert. Somehow, the four of us walk our way to the very front row and sat on the steps alongside some people from the Greek delegation. We were right by the fence that surrounded the stage so we were able to witness everything perfectly. The ceremony began with the songs Es Brent and Eli, Eli. The tone was incredibly somber. I then heard some of the most inspirational speakers I have heard in my life. I was brought to tears. Natan Sharansky, Chairman of the Jewish Agency of Israel. Mr. Sharansky spoke about how the Nazis tried to remove our identity as Jews. They wanted to completely carry out their final solution and erase the existence of the Jewish identity from ever existing. However, looking at all of us there today, our identity was the one thing thy strengthened. Sharansky explained how easy it is to forget and how we cannot. How it is our responsibility to carry on the stories. The next song I that was sung caused me to really think, to cry, to understand. The song was called "What will become of the memories?". It was written by a child of Holocaust survivors and asks an important question: who will remember and tell the stories of the Holocaust, when the survivors are no longer able to? It was at that moment that I realized that today and yesterday and the days before it and the days to come on this trip are much more then a vacation. Much more then a student learning trip. They are a call to action. I am required to take on the responsibility to be a witness my generation is the last to hear stories directly from survivors like Trudy and the many others I have come in contact with. I must learn and share. I must. The next speaker was an incredibly accomplished man. Rabbi Israel Meir Lau is the Chief Rabbi of Tel-Aviv-Yafo, the former Chief Rabbi of the State of Israel, Chairman of the Yad Vashem Council, and a chiled survivor of the Holocaust. Rabbi Lau has also participated in every March of the Living since its inception in 1988. His story of life was incredible. The Rabbi opened our eyes to how the Nazi regime started way before the in 1939. Kristalnacht, possibly the most horrific night in Jewish history, occured in 1938 and Mein Kampf was published in the late 1920s. The Rabbi was taken to Birkenau at age 7 with his brother. One day the Guestopo was going through a selection and wanted to send the two boys to death. Rabbi Lau knew this was his last chance at life so he gave his first of, now, many speeches to that man. He told him that while he may say he is too young to be a good worker, he is not. He explained that he can drag 2 wagons filled with the water and supplies and he is an essential worker. That, with the combination of a bribe saved the life of the man who stood in front of me. The bribe I speak of was their mother's wedding diamond tied into a lock of his hair that he had kept their from the day he entered the camp up to that day. This Rabbi then spoke about the importance of the State of Israel and its existence. Whether or not it is related to the end of the Holocaust, it is there to show our identity. After they spoke, a few more songs were sung and then the torch lighting began. There were 6 torches light by six different groups of people in memory of the righteous that risked their life to save Jews, survivors who began their lives again after the horrors of the Holocaust, the memory of the 6 million jews who perished, the 1.5 million Jewish children who were murdered by the Nazis, the second and third generation of jewish people who never knew their grandparents, and in honor of the state of Israel. With each torch, a story was told. Here were two that really affected me. One of the torches was lit by the Chief Rabbi of France. He taught us a story of how the Nazis took an entire brigade of soldiers into a tiny Island in Greece home of a few hundred people. After a huge investigation of the Island, the Nazis found 6 Jews. However, because they didn't want anyone to be able to witness the atrocities, the Nazis took all 6 of these people to Birkenau by train (a few hundred miles away) just to gas them. One other story was of a blond haired, blue eyed man who was also a child of the Holocaust, however at that time he was a woman. His mother heard that the Nazis liked the young girls more then the young boys so she had him grow his hair long and wear girls clothes. He was sent to the Ghetto and one day they were doing a selection and he was pointed to go off to the right with the weak women and children. Being the smart person he was, he did not go their and instead, going away from his mother, went to the left. The SS stopped him ask what he was doing. Before he could say anything else, the other SS said to let him go to the side to get saved. The second SS man said that he looked like his daughter and should be saved and here he is today. This survivor brought an interesting thought. Yes, Hitler and the high officers were lunatics, however the SS and the Nazis were not all crazy people. They were people with daughters that looked like him. This man closed by telling us that for the past 70 years he has had nightmares daily, but was never able to cry. He said, after seeing all 10,000 of us today, alive and remembering, hopefully he can cry tonight. After the sixth torch was lit, the entire delegation joined together in the Mourner's Kaddish and followed that up with Hatikvah, the Israeli national anthem. It's weird, I have never been to Israel and, although it is my homeland, I don't really have any true connection to it. Today, at that moment, I felt a connection. Throughout the day I was holding up an Israeli flag for the entire March. At that point I draped it around myself and felt comfort. At the end of the week I will be flying into Israel and I will really be able to say, now more then ever, that I am home. I will be with my people where my heritage roots from.

The March was over. The rest of the day really isn't that important. We arrived in Warsaw after a long 5 hour bus ride and will have more somber experiences in the next few days I'm sure.

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