Kristallnacht 2020

[Cannot seem to embed YouTube video so please have a look via this link:  Kristallnacht]

My father was in Berlin during Kristallnacht. Actually, his family had been warned about the possible pogrom and had gone into hiding in the attic of a house in the suburbs. They were there with about 10 other people, for quite a few days. The video above gives a brief version of what happened next. For the rest of his story, the Museum of Jewish Heritage in NYC features "Albert's Story" as an educational tool in their Shoah curriculum. You can see more of it here.

To be honest, my father never talked that much about his experiences. He always said that he would answer any questions that we had. The problem for me was, I didn't know which questions to ask. With regard to Kristallnacht, the most striking part of his story for me was always when he spoke about going back home after it was (supposedly) all over. The family travelled separately, and my father was with his father, Alex. He told me how he could feel the shards of glass as he walked along the street, he could feel them through his shoes. And he said that there was a moment in the U-Bahn when he lost hold of his father's hand. That is the memory that sticks with me, the feeling in that instant.

Today, this date also marks the moment when I went to the German Embassy in London with my mother 3 years ago and we reclaimed our German citizenship. It was not a conscious choice to have the appointment that day, yet it made sense that it was then that a smidgeon of something we had lost was returned to us. 

We mourn what cannot be restored, and we are hopeful that a new chapter of healing is now possible. There's a lot to do - let's get busy!

Why it's Important to Remember

the last Red Cross note received from my mother's grandmother, who was murdered in 1942. All that is known is that they went to Riga, then to Stutthof concentration camp. There are no other details on record. Her final message to her daughter expresses joy at the news of her granddaughter's birth. 

Someone on Facebook posted today regarding their feelings about Holocaust Memorial Day. They felt strongly that they did not want to make grief from a dreadful past appear to be the central tenet of contemporary Judaism. They argued that the best way of action is to live a joyous Jewish life, thus making sense out of having survived. I wrote the following in response to that thought:

"This afternoon I shared my previous blogpost with my English language class of 18-year-old Italian young men. The Giorno della Memoria is taken very seriously in Italy. For at least one week beforehand, the television and other media are full of programmes and articles related to it, and there are public events in towns and cities across the land.

In class today I spoke to Alessandro, Singh, Riccardo, Luca, Mohamed, Matteo, Issam and others. I shared a brief version of the short life and cruel death at Buchenwald of my great-uncle Hermann. And then we talked about remembering.

What does it mean to remember? On a personal level, I mourn my family members. Our community mourns its victims. But what are these students of mine supposed to remember? I asked them what they thought. One said, murdered Jews? Ok, I said, Why? They looked puzzled.

It so happens that there was an election here yesterday, and most of these kids didn't vote. I asked them why. Well, the politicians are corrupt, and even if they say they will do what you want, they change their minds after the election. What's the point? I then asked, do you know what important event happened in Germany in 1933? Nobody knew. Someone guessed - did Hitler become Dictator? No! I said. That was when Hitler was democratically elected.

People with extreme views generally vote, I said. Those who decide not to take part leave the field free for such people. And then look what can happen. Hitler got enough power democratically, and then was able to become a dictator. You need to remember this. You need to remember what this can lead to. And you need to remember that it is in your hands to make sure such things cannot happen again.

We are not only grieving the worst thing that humans have ever done. We are witnesses, to help the world remember, so humans do not do it again. So we must remember.

If sharing a little personal remembrance on a national day of memory may help to illustrate the horror in a way that is more tangible than incomprehensible numbers, I will do it.

As for living our tradition joyfully in spite of the Holocaust, that is the other side of the coin. What a gift it is to the world to show that it is possible to live again, to love again, to build lives and families again after such a disaster. For me it goes hand in hand with remembering, rather than choosing between one or the other."

Once the last eyewitness of the Shoah has died, and that time isn't far away, we need to have a good explanation for why the new generations should care about what happened. If they are not Jewish or Roma/Sinti or LGBTQ+ or Communist or connected to any of the most well-known groups that are named when speaking about Nazi persecution, there will be little difference between this historical event and any other throughout history. We need to find a way for this memory to be relevant to all future generations.

When will they realise that remembering what happened, how it all went pear-shaped, will give them vital information for the safety and well-being of their own lives, and their families and their communities. This is work we still need to do. And it begins with telling the story.