Each year a group of WHSAD students visits The Jewish Heritage Museum-A Living Memorial to The Holocaust to bear witness not only to the atrocities that took place in Europe but also to the strength of the human spirit. Such trips provide perspective and information that can only be gleaned from textbooks; therefore, those students in attendance deepened their understanding of these times through exhibits, artifacts, personal narratives, etc. Below, a few students have provided their thoughts about the trip and how such knowledge will impact them for the rest of their lives.
The Jewish Heritage Museum was a fascinating experience, providing me with new facts about the lifestyle and the horrific changes that arrived. People back then suffered from so many struggles because of the indecent German society. They were separated from their families/ friends while also being ripped away from their homes. But the new facts I learned was that before Jews were sent to concentration camps, families sent their children to safety. In the Dominican Republic, 10,000 to 100,000 Jewish children were offered the opportunity to stay in the country away from the Nazis. I also learned the Jewish Religion, Judaism, where they keep prized possessions such as their Torah (Hebrew Bible) revealing all the laws and stories of Judaism. The museum also contains objects from former Nazi soldiers and Jews such as the bullets they used in their guns and the Jews had special artifacts from their homes. All citizens in some concentration camps were forced to wear a numbered tattoo on their arm, and wear only one piece of clothing, and some required to shave their hair off. The Holocaust was the most horrific event that could’ve ever happened, because of the large number of Jews that were killed (6 million).
-Alanis Garcia
The Jewish Heritage Museum was a very amazing experience for me. I always like learning more about the Holocaust, and it was very nice to get a different perspective on how things were during the time and what the Jewish people had to go through. One thing that definitely stood out to me and that I learned was how truly cruel the Nazis were towards the Jewish people. My tour guide had mentioned that the Nazis would tell a group to dig a large pit which was absolutely horrible because it didn’t matter the weather or if they were sick. After they would build the pits they were told to take off their clothing and unfortunately they would be shot in the pit that they had dug up. My favorite part of the museum was probably all of the artifacts. It was good to hear about everything happening, but personally I loved looking at the artifacts in the museums and reading about them. I would definitely return to the museum and especially with my father because he likes to study theology and one of the topics he likes is the beliefs of Jewish people. So I would definitely come back and maybe see something that I might not have seen the first time.
-Mia Brito
What I learned is that some Jewish people changed their identities to save their lives. Others hid, escaped, or resisted. A Jewish person’s fate often depended upon the actions of non-Jewish people: and bystanders. Hiding assumed many forms. Some families, particularly children, were hidden by non-Jewish people, whereas other individuals assumed different identities using false documentation to pass as Christians.
-Nathaniel Edwards
Some things I found interesting on the trip was the amount of history the museum described. One example of this is when they described the ghettos in Germany and what it actually meant. Another thing that was interesting is how they described what Hitler did. There was this one photo of him in front of the Eiffel Tower that really stood out to me, and not in a positive way. Another fact is that the Germans completed executions at a high rate, the way the museum described it really made me feel terrible for their suffering. The Jewish heritage trip was a really nice trip where you learned so much about their history and even from families living in New York today.
-Jacob Rivera
On March 14 my classmates and I went to the Jewish Heritage Museum.The museum was so beautiful and very well kept. They had multiple sections of different points of Jewish history which I admired the whole time there. I learned about the many stories of Jewish people throughout history. I learned the true and unfiltered tragedies of the Holocaust. I learned the complexities of war and of the innocent people that get lost in it. I learned the importance of family and how you will sacrifice everything for them and put them before your own. I learned that some Jewish kids were sent aways from their families to England in order to be saved from the atrocities that were taking place in Germany at the time. They had no knowledge that they would never see their families again and their families that stood in Germany had no knowledge if they would survive to even see their children again. I learned the hardships people went through and the horrors that were their life all because of one person that had sinful beliefs and spread that through the world.
-Elizabeth Cruz
This trip was amazing. Stepping into that presence was sad and disheartening, but finding each person’s story brings me peace and prosperity. How they tried to do anything possible to live their lives to going into hiding, to also try and save their lives because at the end of the day. They were just religious people trying to worship their god and to live like the rest of us to be happy in this not so happy world.
-Emmanuel Veras