Sometimes time seems to go slowly before you know everything will change, start again. This year I am growing up, more so than I’ve ever had to in the past. Right now I want time to derail, keep me in this state of home, safety, boredom, and following what I’m told. I will have to make my own decisions, fend for myself, be myself, and take responsibility. I can do. I know I can do it. Let’s go!
~SB
Yesterday in class we discussed something devastating to me, the Holocaust. The Holocaust was the systematic persecution and annihilation of 11 million individuals who were seen as “others.” Those who were targeted included; 6 million Jews, (two-thirds of the total European Jewish population), as well as, those who are handicapped, Gypsies, homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Catholics, Poles, Soviet prisoners of war, and political dissidents. It took place in Nazi controlled Germany between 1933 and 1945.The Holocaust was the extermination of people not for who they were but for what they were and their failure to fall into the “Aryan ideal.”
I was disappointed in the amount of time allotted for this topic and I feel we would need more than a few hours to even to scratch the surface. This is extremely personal for me, and I have been learning about it my entire life. This is the first experience I’ve had discussing the Holocaust outside of a religious setting. I went to Israel earlier this year and visited Yad Vashem, the Holocaust museum. It was sickening, moving, and necessary. When I talk about this event that happened a short time ago, I feel it. The graphic novel could be deemed offensive to some people but I strangely appreciated the work. The story needs to be told, the Holocaust survivors will not be around much longer but the Holocaust deniers will always be around. If this medium can reach a larger audience that’s a good thing, but I worry people who aren’t Jewish will see a cartoon and think fiction—it’s easier to believe it’s fiction but it’s not. If we don’t stand up to hate right when it happens we are doomed to repeat history. Maus by Art Spiegleman did not portray the Holocaust well in my opinion as a stand a lone work; there are multitudes of other Holocaust literature, film, interviews, and pictures that should be seen to truly understand what happened—although hopefully none of us will ever truly understand.
Something brushed over was the number—11 million individuals. 11 million lives gone, wiped off the earth. Can we even conceptualize that number? The children whose lives ended before they began? At Yad Vashem there was a children’s wing of the museum where we walked through a dark room of reflected light, which looked like twinkling stars and a tape playing the exterminated children’s names. We were told to remember one name we heard. When we all got through the darkness we said the name we chose aloud and kept one memory alive. One light that never had the chance to shine, one person who never got to be a child. We have to remember these numbers as people, someone like you or me. Think of entire neighborhoods of people, gone. Entire families,gone. Think of being the “lucky one” and surviving this, and being without your family, your friends, your life, your body, being human.
One point brought up in class was “why didn’t they leave right in the beginning?” The simple answer is, there was nowhere to go. It wasn’t that easy to leave your life, your country, everything you’ve worked for. Imagine being told you’re no longer American, you’re different, you’re the other. Imagine through propaganda having your peers keep silent as your rights are stripped little by little until your life is reduced to the death camps. Imagine being stripped of your clothes, possessions, family, everything. A positive light that shines through a horrid and dreadful experience was the creation of the state of Israel. After 2000 years of being scattered there’s finally a place the Jews can go, a homeland.
A quote I will leave you with: ”The important thing is that one should not become indifferent to the suffering of others, that one should not stand by and just raise one’s hands and say, “There’s nothing I can do, I’m just a little one person,” because I think what everyone of us does matters” Margit Meissner, Holocaust Survivor.Each of us can do something. Each of us can stand up when someone isn’t treated right, each of us can evaluate our own prejudices and fix them. We are all just people. We are human beings. Let’s eliminate “the other” and appreciate one another. Most importantly we can never forget.
~SB
A few Resources to Learn about the Holocaust
http://www1.yadvashem.org/yv/en/museum/index.asp?WT.mc_id=ggcamp&WT.srch=1
http://history1900s.about.com/od/holocaust/tp/holocaustpictures.htm
Margit Meissner, Holocaust Survivor: The important thing is that one should not become indifferent to the suffering of others, that one should not stand by and just raise one’s hands and say, “There’s nothing I can do, I’m just a little one person,” because I think what everyone of us does matters.
Never thought we’d have a last kiss
Never imagined we’d end like this
Your name, forever the name on my lips, ohh
So I’ll watch your life in pictures like I used to watch you sleep
And I’ll feel you forget me like I use to feel you breathe
And I’ll keep up with our old friends just to ask them how you are
Hope it’s nice where you are
And I hope the sun shines and it’s a beautiful day
And something reminds you, you wish you had stayed
We can plan for a change in weather and time
I never planned on you changing your mind
So, I’ll go, sit on the floor wearing your clothes
All that I know is I don’t know
How to be something you miss
I never thought we’d ever last kiss
Never imagined we’d end like this
Your name, forever the name on my lips
Just like our last kiss, forever the name on my lips
Forever the name on my lips, just like our last
Commentary: It’s tough when friendships fade, memories become distant, and friends become strangers. Growing up means growing apart at times. When your life is reduced to pictures, and fronts. I love the line, “I don’t know how to be something you miss.” I don’t. And I can only be happy, maybe our paths will cross again some day.
Walden is a work that has made me consciously think about my life, how I live it and how I want to live. Thoreau conveys the message that we must live deliberately and thoughtfully. He encourages simplification, and being conscious of necessity versus luxury. He wants us to be aware of our environment and work with it. He notes the aesthetic beauty of nature, and beauty of solidarity. I see similarities in my life before I encountered this work. I am very conscious of what I eat, and living a healthy lifestyle. I started learning how to cook and create masterpieces out of vegetables ingredients. My dad and I started an organic garden in our backyard before I left for this course. I spend money on experience and necessities, rarely on luxury items. I seem to be a Thoreauvian without even knowing it.
After reading Walden at Walden Pond I feel that taking this course has been a once in a lifetime opportunity for learning the book’s true meaning. Walden isn’t meant to merely paint a picture but to have the reader paint his or her own interpretation and do something. Learning is not simply reading but being active, and experiencing what Thoreau describes. In our society, we must not be apathetic but make decisions intentionally with consequences and ethics in mind. An example of this notion relates to my volunteering experience in Minuteman National Park. Three of my colleagues and I pick up garbage along the trails. Although some may think this is just a trifling job, it has been a significant experience in my time in Concord. I am helping to preserve the environment, and maintain a park filled with our country’s founding history. The people who pollute in the park may consciously think that their one piece of garbage doesn’t matter, or may find carrying their trash out of the park an inconvenience and throw it on the ground guilt-free. Others may not think twice about littering, and not realize someone, someday will have to pick it up. My challenge to anyone reading this blog post is to be conscious of his or her own pollution and to make one change to go green. Another challenge I pose is to think about your values and the type of person you want to be and compare it to what you actually do. Are our ideologies and our actions the same? If not why, and what can we do to close the gap?
~SB
