Neither Yesterdays Nor Tomorrows

by George J Elbaum

Blonie is a town 15 miles west of Warsaw with a current population of approximately 13,000.  When the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939, Blonie’s population was 8700, of which 3000+ were Jewish.  For them, the Holocaust started 2 weeks after the invasion when the Nazis executed 50 civilians, mostly Jews. It continued when the Nazis established the town’s Jewish ghetto in 1940, then the next year when the town’s remaining 2100 Jews were shipped to the Warsaw Ghetto, and from there to the Treblinka extermination camp and their death.  No Jews live in Blonie now.

My introduction to Blonie was on May 26, 2017: at the dinner for Leaders of Dialogue organized by Forum for Dialogue, I met Dorota Berlińska, a social studies teacher and school principal at Blonie’s M.M. Kolbe Junior High, who has led her students in restoring some of the remains of Jewish heritage in their town, and where I’d be speaking in 5 days.  Indeed, on the morning of May 31, 2017, my wife Mimi and I traveled to Blonie accompanied by Zuzanna Radzik, the Forum’s Executive Board Member, who would also translate my talk into Polish as not all of Blonie students were fully fluent in English.

On arrival at the school we were met by the principal, Dorota Berlinska, and a welcome committee of students Janek, Julka, Wiktoria, Maja and Kasia, who conducted a short interview.  Led by Maja and Kasia, these students had previously done a school project about Irena Sendler, who had heroically smuggled and thus saved approximately 2500 Jewish children out of the Warsaw ghetto.

The school had already received my books in Polish which had just been translated and published by the Forum, and those parts of the book that I normally read during a talk were now read from the Polish edition by students Julia, Amelia, Emilia, Michał.

During the Q&A that followed the first question was asked in fluent English by Krzysztof, who took the initiative to have already read my book and thus asked several very pertinent questions.  More questions continued, with Lukasz and others asking many excellent ones, and this was followed by a lively book signing during which I had short but enjoyable chats with many of the students, all in English.  Receiving the school’s presents, I was surprised that the colorful, handmade ceramic mugs were filled to the brim with marzipan, my favorite confectionary, and then I realized that I describe that in my book which some of them had already read. It was all a very, very enjoyable experience, organized by the school’s principal Dorota Berlinska and teachers Dorota Ambroziak, Joanna Szymanska, and Mariola Kopanska-Wyrzykowska.

Introduction by Dorota Berlinska, the school’s principal

talk starts

by George J Elbaum

During our visit to Warsaw’s Gymnazjum No. 11 it seemed that everything worked so well.  The staff was warm and welcoming, the students were well-prepared and enthusiastic, the library where I spoke was an intimate space with good acoustics, so a microphone was not needed, and we were given beautiful flowers, lovely cards painted by one of the students, plus chocolate-coated plums (my wife Mimi’s favorite) – it all produced a comfortable feeling of a friendly conversation.  After leaving Gymnazjum   No. 11 Mimi and I talked about it being such a gratifying experience.  In short, that’s the best way to describe it!

The event was organized by the school’s Russian teacher Halina Danyluk (with whom I had an enjoyable conversation in Russian) with support from English teacher Marzena Zimnowlodzka, and arranged by teacher Violetta Tarnowska from Gymnazjum No. 3, who attended the whole session.

the audience

starting my talk

by George J Elbaum

Gimnazjum No. 32 (named after poet Adam Asnyk) is located in Warsaw’s Praga district on the east bank of the Wisla river.  Our first visit to the school was in May 2014, which my wife and I remember very well because of the staff’s warm hospitality and conversation over a delicious family-style Polish lunch. Today’s presentation was organized by the school’s History teacher Slawomir Kaniasty with active support from English teacher Agnieszka Galaszewska.  (Mr. Kaniasty also created a giant GE forming my initials with my books – photo below – that were just published in Polish by the Forum for Dialogue.)

My presentation was attended by Ms. Galaszewska and her students, the school’s Director Renata Wilczynska, and Mr. Kaniasty.  Students and officials from several nearby schools were also invited by Ms. Wilczynska and Mr. Kaniasty, resulting in an audience of approximately 100.

After my presentation and book signing for the students, we were about to leave for the next school and an afternoon presentation but Ms. Wilczynska, a warm and strong-willed person, insisted that we have a quick lunch, and there was no other choice but to agree! (Ms. Wilczynska’s daughter Kasia said that her mother is the same way at home, “a typical Polish mother.” 😊)  We enjoyed all of it and look forward to returning, but next time starting not at 9AM, as today, but at lunchtime.

by George J Elbaum

My presentation at Gimnazjum No. 1 started quite normally, with an audience of approximately 100 students sitting on low benches in their gym, per the photo below.  It also ended quite normally, with many of the students coming to me with vocal thanks and enthusiasm and asking me to autograph my books, also in photos below.  Much of the rest of the talk, however, was a first-time and unexpected experience for me, despite the 130+ talks I’ve given in the preceding 7 years.  Within less than 15 minutes of starting my talk, several small groups of students began using their cell phones, talking audibly and giggling among themselves, girls playing with each other’s hair.  This behavior continued even when I purposely paused, approached the nearest group and continued speaking while looking directly at them.  This show of bad manners and lack of discipline was totally ignored by their teacher, till I finally finished abruptly without asking for any questions.  It was truly a disappointing experience.  However, I do appreciate the students who listened and who talked with me afterwards, and whose photos are below.

by George J Elbaum

Gimnazjum No. 3, named for Marshall Jozef Pilsudski, is located in Mokotow on the southern edge of central Warsaw, only a few blocks from the primary school that I attended before leaving for the U.S. in 1949, so going there for my presentation felt a bit like homecoming.  The event was organized by Violetta Tarnowska, the energetic and idealistic teacher of Polish and English.  Some years ago she noticed that students were becoming less and less aware and interested in Warsaw’s history before and during WWII and she wanted to ensure that they learn and remember it, including that of its pre-war Jewish community (which was 1/3 of Warsaw’s total population) and of the Holocaust.  She therefore welcomed and organized my first talk in her school in May 2014 and invited students from other gimnazjums plus representatives of Warsaw school authorities, resulting in an audience of almost 200.  Because my talk would be in English, I was concerned about the need for translation, but Ms. Tarnowska assured me that most of the students were sufficiently competent in English so only unique words or terms would need translation and she would provide for it.  Indeed, I was pleasantly surprised by the students’ competence in English, and in my brief one-to-one conversations with each student during the book signing I was especially surprised at most students’ comfort in speaking with me.

After her successful organization of my May 2014 presentation Ms. Tarnowska continued her interest in providing a broad and balanced education for her students, so in July 2016 she accepted a month-long internship in Seattle’s Holocaust Center for Humanity to broaden her knowledge.  On her return to Warsaw she launched a project with her students consisting of 1,500 hand-painted stones to commemorate the 1.5 million children killed in the Holocaust, and she personally placed it in the Treblinka Museum in Treblinka.  Then, when I informed her of my interest to return to Warsaw in May 2017 to once again give talks in Warsaw schools, she volunteered to arrange these talks.  The results are the 4 talks that I just concluded in Warsaw: in Gimnazjum No. 3, followed by Gimnazjum No. 1, Gimnazjum No. 32, and Gimnazjum No. 11.  I very much appreciate her excellent efforts, the resulting contacts with so many Warsaw students, and their warm and enthusiastic feedback.

Ms. Tarnowska introduced my presentation in her school, which was also attended by the Gimnazjum’s Headmaster Katarzyna Hampel, English teacher Magdalena Cieslik, Jerzy Iwanski, plus Dr. Sylwia Spurek, Poland’s Deputy Ombudsman, who made an important statement to the audience as part of the introduction.

Introduction by organizing teacher Violetta Tarnowska

Violetta Tarnowska’s introductiion

by George J Elbaum

This post is rather unique for my website because it’s the only one about an event where I didn’t talk but only listened, and I was so impressed by what I learned that I decided to post it.  My wife Mimi and I had just arrived in Warsaw to speak at several schools as arranged by the Forum for Dialogue, and they invited us to the opening dinner of the 5^th National Leaders of Dialogue Conference which the Forum organized.  The Leaders of Dialogue was formed by the Forum to connect local activists from across Poland who have been involved in preserving the heritage of Jewish communities that existed in their towns and were annihilated in the Holocaust.  These volunteer activists are Polish, not Jewish, and most of them were unaware of each other, so they welcomed the formation of the Leaders of the Forum and its annual reunion – it made them feel no longer alone in their activism!  I found this very inspiring and accepted the invitation.

The conference’s keynote speaker this year was Marc Skvirsky, an early member of Facing History and Ourselves and now Vice President, and his talk was about Facing History’s activism and educational philosophy.  Marc is from Facing History’s Boston headquarters but I never met him despite my 7 years of connection with Facing History, so I welcomed this opportunity and was very pleased with the personal connection.

A short while before the conference the Forum translated and published my book, turning Neither Yesterdays Nor Tomorrows into Bez wczoraj, bez jutra. The task was led by Jakub Petelewicz and the book’s translator is Anna Brzostowska. The result was excellent, and a copy of the Polish book was given to each of the conference’s 60 attendees, with some after-dinner autographing as usual.  Thank you, Jakub and Anna.

The week-end event was held in Bialobrzegi on Zegrze Lake, an hour’s drive from Warsaw, and immediately prior to the dinner & conference we witnessed a beautiful sunset across the water, which Mimi photographed.

Andrzej Folwarczny, President of the Forum for Dialogue, opens the conference

conference keynote speaker Marc Skvirsky, VP of Facing History

by George J Elbaum

Lighthouse Community Charter High School, founded in 2002, is a public charter school in East Oakland and serves 750 students in grades K-12, with 214 students in grades 9-12.  The school is located in a light industrial park near the Oakland airport.  Because of its high population of low-income students of color (83% Hispanic, 9% Black, 3% Asian, 2% White) and 80% participating in the free or reduced-price lunch program, the school’s test scores are rated by Great Schools Ratings in “Test scores for low income students” and receive a 9-out-of-10.  These are compared to state averages as follows: English Proficiency — 81% vs. 44%; Math Proficiency — 48% vs. 33%; Graduation Rate for low-income students — 82% vs. 79%; and graduates completing the necessary requirements to be eligible for UC/CSU — 98% vs. 42%.  Furthermore,  95% of Lighthouse graduates, almost all of whom are first-generation in their families to attend college, are accepted into four-year colleges.  Lighthouse was named the Hart Vision California Charter School of the Year in 2013, and the #1 Bay Area high school for closing the achievement gap for low-income Latino students in 2016 by Innovate Public Schools.   All very impressive!

I first visited Lighthouse on March 21, 2016 and it was a memorable experience for me.  For the previous 6 years of giving talks in schools, all questions during the Q&A dealt with the subject of my talks: my Holocaust childhood and adulthood.  Yet the first question asked by a Lighthouse student on March 21, 2016 (early in the US Presidential campaign) was whether the campaign of Donald Trump had similarities to that of Hitler’s in the 1930s.  I was amazed and impressed that current US politics were of such impact and concern to a high school student as to reach back 80+ years into a shameful period of European history and ask me for a comparison.  Since that visit, I’ve spoken in 40 other schools and the question of the Trump-Hitler comparison has been asked more and more often, including today again at Lighthouse.  However, for me it started at Lighthouse a year ago.

Teacher Catherine Cole organized my presentation for her 11^th grade students who have been studying the Holocaust by reading Elie Wiesel’s Night and doing term projects on resistance during the Holocaust, including case studies such as the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, the White Rose, Martha and Waitstill Sharp, the Edelweiss Pirates and Bishop Clemens von Galen.  In attendance also were Lighthouse teachers Sherman Moore, Charles Wagner, and Zachary Harrington.

Sarah Altschul of Facing History and Ourselves arranged today’s presentation and made the introduction.  She was accompanied by a new Facing History colleague, Hadiya McCullough.

Letters from students

A couple of weeks after my visit to Lighthouse a pack of notes/cards arrived in my mailbox, all made by the students with fanciful drawings, cut-outs, etc. (see photo below).  However, we had just left for Poland where a series of talks had been arranged for me in 7 schools, and where my book had just been translated & published in Polish.  After returning home, still jet-lagged, my wife Mimi & I read all of them, excerpted those sentences or phrases which really resonated with us because of their sensitivity or empathy, and the results are below.

• I like that you said “always be for something, not against something.
• Live the moment. Not the past.
• The part that stuck with me the most is when you said: “Don’t let anyone discourage you, and keep an open mind.” This one quote especially stuck with me because it has motivated me to follow my dreams and continue to pursue them no matter what anyone else says to me.
• Thank you for showing me the real sacrifice you and your mother had to go through to survive. This made me appreciate my family and be grateful to have what I have.
• Your words “Then I realized my story has value” was really powerful. I thought how everyone’s story has value and that life discourages many of us to never get a chance to share them.
• I hope someday I will be able to tell my story. I am a survivor too like you.  I come from a town in Mexico where many families like mine had to move from town to town to cities to be safe and stay alive.  I lost many family members, like you.  I’m able to connect with you in some parts of your life.  In Mexico I had to change my name too until I came to the U.S.  I started a new life, I learned a new language, a new culture.  I learned so much from you on Friday.
• Your words “Don’t let anyone discourage you” inspire me & motivate me to work hard.
• The question about Hitler’s campaign compared to today’s political climate was refreshing because we are not only the events of our past but also the actions and thoughts of today.
• LUCK is all you need when nothing else works!
• The thing that I will always remember is the sugar cube scene. It was such a strong scene for me because that sugar cube was the first real taste of freedom.  It actually left a good taste in my mouth.
• Your story has taught me more than the books have ever taught me about the Holocaust.
• Thank you for motivating me to push through school to be someone.
• Thank you for not only sharing your story but also that of your mother, whose strength and wits remind me of my own mother, which made me connect with you that much more.
• I can connect to your story when you said that your mom worked with fake ID and papers because my family did the same.
• The ultimate personal question of what type of person I want to be in this world, an upstander, bystander or perpetrator, is something I think about every day.
• Your story really made me think about my hardships and how they’ve made me the young woman I am today. I’ve spent the majority of my life trying to forget the past, but your story and reflection of your past has made me want to accept my past.
• I’d like to start opening up more about the events I’ve lived through so the people around me can get to know me better and so I can get to living without any unwanted baggage.
• You and your wife make a beautiful couple, and the small part of your relationship that I saw is so beautiful. I admire that so much, and I hope to have that type of support from my future soulmate😊

introduction by Facing History’s Sarah Altschul

with the audience

by George J Elbaum

Washington High School (WHS) is a public school with an enrollment of approximately 2000 students of diverse backgrounds.  Together with Jack Weinstein of Facing History & Ourselves, I first visited Washington High School in March 2011 and spoke to a humanities class of 11th and 12th graders entitled “Literature, Justice, and Society.”  That course, which was developed by a cohort from the school after they had attended a Facing History seminar more than a decade ago, is still taught at WHS and focuses on genocide, human rights, and contemporary issues.  Literature is the entry point for discussions about difficult historical and contemporary topics.  In addition, social studies and general English courses include specific units of instruction on the Holocaust and many other topics meant to promote historical awareness, responsible decision-making, and upstander behavior.

As I had experienced in 2011, the current WHS students also demonstrated clear understanding of the basic historical narrative of the Holocaust and sincere respect for the process of meeting a survivor.  Jack started our session with an introduction about their responsibility to become “witnesses-once-removed” by virtue of having interacted with a witness to history.  It would be theirs to carry forward the messages and lessons of a survivor to the next generation.  After Jack’s introduction, I gave my presentation followed by Q&A, and again the sophistication and depth of the students’ questions and interest reflected the quality of their preparation.  In fact, the questions continued till eventually the students and I left the auditorium to finish outside and take a group photo.  It is always a pleasure to see the results good teachers produce in their students.

Social studies and English classes currently engaged in the study of the Holocaust and of Holocaust literature participated in the current event.  Assistant Principals Nathania Chaney-Aiello, Erica Donahue, and Jeff Speckels coordinated the session.  Principal Bob Moran had previously arranged for English and social studies teachers to meet with Jack Weinstein for professional development sessions on integrating new Facing History resources on the theme of Holocaust and Human Behavior in their respective courses.  All the students in attendance had completed a multi-week unit of instruction on the topic, and most had read Elie Wiesel’s memoir, Night, or Art Spiegelman’s graphic novel, Maus.

Afterwards I learned from Jack Weinstein that my talk led to writing assignments for the students, including reflective essays, letters, and messages from WHS students in response to my session. The writing project was coordinated by teacher Monica Sullivan, who also helped to organize both the session and the professional development workshops that preceded the event.

Letters from students

A couple of weeks after my visit to WHS I received a thick packet with 125(!) letters from students.  With so many letters, my wife Mimi & I needed several after-dinner readings before we read all of them and, with each letter, excerpting those sentences or phrases which really resonated with us, either because of their sensitivity or empathy or beautiful phrasing.  The results are below.

• You seem to me as a man who has completely overcome the trials dealt to him. You don’t seek revenge, you don’t spread hate, you exude honor and kindness.  You are an inspiration to me.  I hope that someday I can come to a place where I no longer feel such terrible anger at my past and the person who wronged me.  You have set a perfect example.
• You made the Holocaust and all its outcomes come to life for me personally, and the audience as a whole.
• Your story helped me bring myself to how it could’ve felt during these times. Instead of facts, I was learning and understanding the Holocaust in an emotional and psychological way, something I would not have without your story.
• Your story deeply touched me and changed me as a person. You have left a beautiful mark on me.
• Your stories about courage and pride of who you are in the face of fear have inspired me to be courageous when I experience sentiments of hatred toward my middle Eastern Heritage or Islamic beliefs.
• Thank you. You have helped me in ways I am unable to describe in words.
• Recently a friend of mine was being bullied. Your wise words got me thinking that if I would have stood up for her then I would have made a positive influence on my world and would have made her life better.
• I better understand that this could happen to anyone, and that it could happen again.
• After hearing you speak, I feel that I need to cherish life every day because the same thing can happen at any time.
• I hope that you continue to talk to different schools for a very long time because your story gives us a lesson that no textbook or documentary ever could.
• I feel as though I am a bit more prepared to face the discrimination that goes on in the world, and I have your eyewitness account to thank for that.
• You made my day so much better and I’m proud to be able to retell your stories. Each story I have learned from you I have taken to heart.
• After hearing you speak, I feel though I can be open to other people’s ideas, and be kind to people, because, after all, we are on earth with other humans, and might as well be as kind and welcoming as possible.
• After hearing you speak I can better understand how lucky I am to be born when I was and where.
• Future generations may lose clarity but will always share sympathy.
• I will forever cherish your story and hope to tell it to my children one day.
• You didn’t just show us a time in history but also the emotion behind it.
• You are a different voice that people need to hear. You showed me that you can live a normal life and be successful even after hard times.
• It’s good to see that you are relatively the same as any other person just living life.
• It’s stories like yours that remind us to be human, the most important part of learning history so that it doesn’t repeat itself.
• It was quite interesting to hear of your chances of luck, as if fate itself had decided you had to live to tell the tale to us.
• I felt as if I could see just a faint outline of what it was like to live in hiding, to run, to survive in a world that hated you.
• I had several near-death experiences when I was growing up, and like you, luck was there to save me. For example, I was rock climbing and I lost grip on a rock and fell, but luckily there was a thick root sticking out from a tree on top and my foot tangled around it and saved me from falling six stories high while hanging upside down.
• After hearing you speak about your mother and grandmother, I felt way more respect and pride in my heart for my parents because if it weren’t for them I wouldn’t be in America, studying and writing this letter to you.
• The story you told us was really sad – it made me cry a little.
• My teacher gave us only 10 minutes to write so I have to go, but thank you so much for coming and I am so sorry for what happened to you.
• After hearing you speak I feel as though I can help try to prevent bullying situations that can happen at school due to race, ethnicity, or even their backgrounds.
• You said something that I have not stopped thinking about since: stand with things, not against things.
• Your advice on facing hatred in the world today was very interesting, and I will keep it in mind the next time I come across a situation.
• I wanted to let you know that I really appreciated the way you told your story and I feel more need to stand up to hatred.
• I was in tears for most of your story. Your words that hatred is taught is meaningful because it’s really the truth!
• I feel as if things in life that I thought are bad aren’t even close to being as bad as you had, so now I see that I need to be grateful for the little things and not be a brat when I don’t get my way. So thank you.
• This experience will help me be even more open minded, and help me to remember that acceptance is super important.
• I truly consider myself lucky for the fact that I got to hear you today. I only wish that you spoke for a longer time so that I could have skipped the boring school classes. 😊
• I now better understand the impact that this atrocity had on individuals rather than on a country as a whole.
• Your speaking helped me realize that not only is it okay to speak about personal issues but to also embrace your past.
• I believe this moment to be one of the most important memories I will have.
• Your story of surviving the Holocaust as a child has me more thankful for what I have, even if it’s not much.
• Your story has motivated me to make the relationship with my family better, and to be thankful for what I have everyday.
• I will not forget that I got to hear a Holocaust survivor’s testimony in person. Thank you very much for doing this, and I am more than eternally grateful.
• The question you asked us (to answer only to ourselves) had a big impact on me. It made me think if I’d be willing to take a risk to save a four-year-old boy.  Thank you for helping me understand myself.

starting the talk

starting well-organized Q&A

final questions outside the auditorium

by George J Elbaum

Notre Dame High School is an all-girls, Catholic, college preparatory school with an enrollment of 630 students.  Since its founding in 1851, it has been the premier educator of young women of Silicon Valley based on its motto: “Teach them what they need to know for life.”  As such, its focus is on high quality academics, leadership, global citizenship and socially-responsible entrepreneurship.  The student body reflects Silicon Valley’s ethnic and socioeconomic diversity, so that half of the 2016 class comes from homes in which a language other than English is spoken and one quarter of the student body receives financial assistance.

Notre Dame students complete a range of community service activities in their four years, as this teaches them to be “socially responsible and answer the call to be a person of justice” and to try making a difference in the San Jose community.  By their senior year, students design and execute their own Senior Service Learning Project.

Notre Dame’s focus on global citizenship and individual responsibility has been supported by its involvement with Facing History and Ourselves for more than 10 years, starting with a pilot program integrating sophomore history with English.  Facing History units on human rights, genocide studies, racism, art as social protest, and oral history eventually became part of every humanities and science class offered.  There is a FH Student Leadership Group that works within the school and alongside other schools’ parallel groups to effect social change and model participatory citizenship.  Notre Dame students have met and learned from many Facing History resource speakers, including scholars, authors, witnesses to history, survivors of genocides, and upstanders who have made a difference in their communities.

All humanities teachers (English, Social Studies, and Religious Studies) have participated in seminars, workshops, and trainings provided to the school by Facing History–and all staff members have exposure to key themes in annual workshops as well, because Notre Dame is among the 75 schools across the country who are in a partnership through Facing History’s Innovative Schools Network (ISN).

This talk at Notre Dame was organized by Religious Studies teacher Rita Cortez.  I first met Rita when she participated in the educators’ workshop organized by Jack Weinstein of Facing History on January 20, 2016 in Palo Alto, and she invited me to speak at Notre Dame to approximately 160 10th grade World History students on April 20, 2016.  Today was therefore my second visit to Notre Dame, starting with a welcoming pre-presentation lunch and chat with teachers and students, then the presentation and Q&A.  A wonderful atmosphere!  Other Notre Dame humanities teachers in attendance were John Mischke, Nickie Pfaff, and Hilary Orr.

Two weeks after my talk I received a pack of notes from the students, written on lovely, fancifully decorated paper, with the little drawings like an apple tree with a fallen apple added to sweeten the notes (see photo below).  The students’ words were very heartfelt, and the gem that I will always treasure is: “You have motivated me to work to a better future!”

before the talk