I had the good fortune to visit Israel recently, and one of the stops on our trip was the holocaust memorial in Jerusalem. While Yad Vashem was incredibly moving in its own right, there's a moment at the end, where you see the cavern filled with names and the empty spaces where the names are missing, that caught me by surprise. I left heartbroken for the victims and survivors of all the genocides since, whose names we will never know. I couldn't articulate it at the time, as I was surrounded by friends whose families had suffered loss in Germany and Poland and I didn't want them to feel like I marginalized their loss. It's haunted me ever since. What fitting memorial will we have for those in other countries? Will we ever know their names?

Wow, I've been so wrapped up in my essays I didn't even notice, thanks for the heads up. Which is pretty weird because then essays are for a Holocaust studies course...

On my mom's dad side, I will only count immediate family for the moment. My grandfather lost both his parents, his grandparents, over 20 aunts and uncles, countless cousins. He lost two sisters, one brother, one brother in law, one sister in law. Saddest off all, I will list Magda (age 12), Erna (around 8) and Judith (5), Tibor (4) and Edith (2) (ages are inexact due to records) who were all gassed.

On my mum's mum's side, my grandmama suffered in Auschwitz, suffering health issues till her last day, as well PTSD. She lost her parents in the most horrific manner, suffering by seeing her mother and baby brother Moshe shoved into the gas chambers. And then someone told him his three daughters (my aunt Frieda, my grandma and my aunt Lily) were selected for the gas chambers, my great grandfather stopped eating and waited to die. Horribly, the story gets worse. My grandma and her two sisters were taken off the line by a Kapo who knew my aunt Frieda and three other girls died in their place. My grandma never forgave herself till she died. Aunt Lily had her ovaries removed without anesthesia. She had illnesses injected into her spine. She was 12. Even today, she lives in constant pain. She never could have children.

My father's aunt and grandmother were buried alive in pits, suffocating to death. My grandfather, his little brother and their father suffered in a slave labor camp. Both my grandfather and his brother are still injured, and my great grandfather died of related illnesses a short while after, the torture being too much.

I am sparing the worst stories.

I am a living witness to history. I will tell their tales.

Amen. Never again.

Good thoughts.

In graduate school, I led a Holocaust Remembrance ceremony one year. I insisted on making it for 12 million. I got flack from other Jewish students for not focusing on the 6 million and commented to them that I'd be a hypocrite if I denied that others had died as well by the same hands, not to mention lying about history. ALL who died should be remembered so that it never happens again. I studied how the history of people with disabilities were targeted as the practice run for the rest of the "Final Solution". As a history teacher and parent as well, I hope that we don't forget as a culture and as a country, or it will continue to happen over and over. Today I pledge, as I do every year, that my voice will not remain silent on this subject. Hatred and fear and prejudice exist. Speaking up and actively opposing them keeps them from winning.

Edited at 2012-04-20 02:11 am (UTC)

I think about this so much. I grew up on the Holocaust, is that strange? My mother read my brother and I stories about it when we were too small to understand, I think because she had no one else to talk to about it. As I got older I read countless books about the subject. My great-grandmother, grandmother, great-aunt, and great-uncles were all in the camps. I was lucky enough to know my great-grandmother for a long time but she never talked about it. I only talked to my grandmother about it one time but I never forgot her stories of her brothers searching the dead for food and other supplies. My great-grandfather almost died in the firing line but another stepped up and took his place because he had so many children to take care of. Someone else died for him. I wonder how it feels. When I visited Auschwitz last summer I just cried and cried. This is humanity.

Like I said, I think about it a lot.

I didn't lose anyone, but my moms parents almost didn't get married? Denmark was seized by Germany in 1940, and the Germans took large ration chunks of everything from coffee and sugar, to gasoline for cars. So my grandparents had to skip getting a ride to the church, they had to take a bus instead and the priest was a cranky jerk (according to my mom) who almost left so they couldn't get married. They did get married though, so that's something.

Along the way, one must remember that not all Germans was someone's definition of an evil person. One Christmas eve, my grandfather brought home two young German soldiers, though it worried my grandmother a great deal. Wouldn't want to be seen as sympathetic towards the Nazis, would we? The two young soldiers were very grateful in any case, because they returned to Denmark in the mid-60's or so to meet my grandparents again and to say thanks.

Some years ago, Jerry Springer did a show where he reunited Jewish people [especially children] with those who had hidden them during the war. He told how his grandparents always had packed suitcases & money in the car, ready to flee if the need came again.