Wednesday, April 6, 1994 - Grand Hotel, Warsaw

Today I met up with the N.Y. contingent of the March. We (i.e., the four of us who had come directly from Israel, the cameraman, and his wife) drove around for nearly two hours trying to find the NY group. We finally met them at the "Arrivals" gate at the airport. After catching up with school friends on Pesach, college acceptances, etc. we finally settled in for the bus ride ahead. I sat next to a kid named Ryan from Mamaroneck High School, who seems like a really nice guy. Most of the other people I've met are also very friendly. Our bus consists of about 20 Ramaz kids, and another 20 from several public schools. It's interesting having these kids on our bus as opposed to the usual Yeshiva scene. Our bus leader's name is Rabbi Tom Weiner, and he also seems like a great guy.

The NY/BJE group is eight busses big, about 300 kids. On our bus, number 551, is where we find ourselves most of the time. Today, all eight busses traveled together. Our first stop was Tykochin, a small shtet'l outside of Warsaw. There, we went to the synagogue which had been partially destroyed. Looking at the art which was all over the shul, now a museum run by the government, you could really feel that there had once been a strong Jewish community there, which, like so many other towns, was completely destroyed.

From the shul, we walked to the Jewish cemetery. What had once been a large, nice-looking burial ground for the Jewish community now looked like a cornfield. The few tombstones that were still in place were cracked and badly rotted. We spent a while just standing outside in the pouring rain, looking at all that was around us. This place was the result of neglect, on several sides.

After that, we went into the forest at Tykochin, where Jews were marched to and shot, left to die in mass graves. Three large areas were fenced off, and there was a monument in front. The sites were known only because a small child miraculously survived the executions and lived to tell of what happened there. There, some brief words were said, and then Tehillim and Kaddish were recited.

From there, we went to Treblinka. Treblinka was a death camp primarily for the 300,000 Jews of Warsaw. Now, nothing is left of the camp. Concrete blocks meant to simulate railroad ties stretched along the border of the camp. In the center, a large stone monument stands, engraved on three sides with skeletal figures and on the fourth with a menorah. All around this are some 17,000 stones, for all of the villages in Poland that were destroyed in the Shoah. Some actually had names of villages written on them, but most were just sharp rocks sticking out of the ground. Without even beginning to consider the number of human beings killed in the Holocaust, even the number of entire villages that were destroyed is staggering.

At Treblinka, like everywhere else today, the weather was miserable. The sky was overcast, and it was cold outside, and it rained all day. The weather made the bus trips seem longer, the sites more gloomy, and generally made everything a lot more depressing, which I guess was appropriate. After walking around for a while at Treblinka (when we came, an Israeli group was in the middle of ceremony), we gathered around the monument where microphones were set up, and we had a short ceremony. Finally we headed back to the hotel (Grand Hotel), where we arrived at about 10 PM. We went in for dinner and afterwards went up to the rooms, talked, etc.

Thursday, April 7, 1994 - Yom HaShoah - Wanda Hotel, Krakow

The march today was an incredible experience. We got to Auchwitz at abut 2:30 PM. The march went in alphabetical order by country, so the US was close to last. We took our place among the 7,000 marchers for the silent trek from Auchwitz I to Birkenau. The feeling of seeing a sea of blue jackets marching on the very path that had led so many to death was very moving.

Marching in front of me was a group of survivors. As I watched them, I tried to imagine the courage that it must take to return to a place where they had been through hell on earth, go back to where they had seen their friends and family executed by the Nazis. On the way to Birkenau, Polish police and citizens were lined up, many staring at us go by. Some lived right near the camp, and were hanging up laundry as we passed. I couldn't understand how someone could possibly live within sight of a place where so many were killed so brutally.

For the first time since our arrival, the rain stopped pouring, merely an hour before the march. As we neared Birkenau, we saw the tower and train tracks which led into the camp. As we neared the end of the march at the ruins of a crematorium, a seemingly endless list of names of martyrs was called out, as the procession filed in.

Looking around, all I could see was blue jackets, the ruins of the crematorium, the banners of the different countries, and lots of Israeli flags. The ceremony at Birkenau consisted mainly of speeches. The Chief Rabbi of Israel spoke, among other politicians and prominent figures. Towards the end, a prayer was recited. The next moment was one of the most powerful ones of the entire day. Hatikva was sung. The image of 7,000 Jews of all types from all over the world, gathered at the ruins of Auchwitz-Birkenau, singing the national anthem of the Jewish homeland was unbelievable. The message was clear: we are still here - while we remember the dead, this is the march of the living, and despite the loss of the Shoah, it is we, not the Nazis, who remain. This thought was echoed as the seven thousand sung "Od Lo Avdah Tikvateinu".

Each of us was given a wooden grave marker, on which we were to write the names of family members who had been killed, or any appropriate message. After the ceremony, I went with my mother to place the marker in the ground near the crematoria. We lit candles in memory of our family members that were killed.

Looking around, the number of people in blue jackets was truly overwhelming. Throughout the ceremony, the crowd seemed huge. What is scary is that far more than 6,000 people were killed every day in Auchwitz.

While the camp was in many ways what I expected, the thing that surprised me most was the sheer size of it. Seeing the endless rows of barracks (and, in many cases, only the chimneys where barracks had once been) made me realize how huge the camp had been.

While I knew that I'd soon be getting back on the bus and going to a hotel, I tried to imagine myself at Auchwitz, where the barbed wire was not only real, but electrified as well. I tried to picture S.S. officers with guns at each now-empty guard post. While it was interesting to try, it was obvious that I would never truly be able to understand what that generation went through, never really know what terror is. The recurring message, though, was that 50 years after the Nazis tried to destroy us, we're still here and they're gone; we have our own state, and they're just a terrible stain on the book of history. While there are questions that can never be answered, like "how can man be capable of such cruelty?" and "how could the world just stand by watching?", I did feel a little better at the end of the march.

While waiting for the busses outside the camp, our discussions eventually took a lighter tone, which may seem strange, under the circumstances. While it may seem wrong to laugh and smile at the very site where so many were killed, laughter was, for many of us, a way of remaining sane after what we had witnessed. Besides being therapeutic, our laughter helped us realize that we can, and must, go on with life, and that we can be happy, because ultimately, we survived.

After sitting on the bus for an hour, we left Birkenau and headed to the hotel. After dinner, we got our stuff and went to the rooms. Mati (my good friend and roommate for the March) and I got a nice room on the first floor. Since we'll be here for three days, we can actually settle in, which is a nice change. Our bus gathered together in Tom's room for a discussion/kumzits. We went around the room, and each person said their name and shared a moment which they found to be especially moving and significant. Our bus is really a great group of people, and after a little discussion, Matt (who had a guitar) led us in some songs. Many of the kids on the bus that go to public school have very little real connection to Judaism, yet the past two days have had an incredibly deep impact on them (and all of us).

Tomorrow, we return to Auchwitz for a thorough tour. While I can't wait for Israel, I'm extremely glad that we're able to be at all these sights and bear witness to what took place. it is our duty, as the last generation that will be able to hear tales of the Holocaust first-hand from survivors, to teach our friends, family, and children about what happened, and ensure that the Shoah and the six million that perished are never forgotten.

Saturday, April 9, 1994 - Hotel Wanda, Krakow

Well, I now have 2 days worth to write and it's about 3:30 AM, so I'll try my best to think back... On Friday, we went back to Auchwitz and Birkenau for a complete tour. Auchwitz I is mostly reconstructed, but it was rebuilt so that most of it is the same way it originally was. Now, the camp is really more of a museum.

First, we saw a 20 minute film in Auchwitz. It was in black and white with English narration, and parts of it were very graphic. Walking around the camp, we had a Polish guide. We walked through the barracks, which were now exhibits, each barrack with a different "theme". One was about the Jews, in a Yad Vashem type style. There was one barrack that showed actual living conditions, which were incredibly bad. We saw cells that were about three feet square and completely dark where four people were packed in to stand for hours on end.

Another exhibit showed the belongings of the Jews that were confiscated. There were huge amounts of everything - carefully labeled suitcases, eyeglasses, shoe polish, packages of hair, about 40,000 pairs of shoes, and lots more. One exhibit had clothing taken from babies.

Sunday, April 10, 1994 - Majdanek

I never got to sleep last night, but I'm now sitting outside Majdanek. I'll just pick up where I left off yesterday [description of Friday]: After we saw the barracks exhibits, we went to a gallows, specially constructed after the war, where Rudolph Hoess, a high-ranking Nazi officer, was hanged following post-war trial. Right next to this was a gas chamber and crematorium. Though Auchwitz was not a major death camp, they had one "small" crematorium which is still intact, as opposed to the larger ones in Birkenau that were destroyed.

Going through the chambers was very eerie. The room was completely solid concrete, with a steel door, and holes in the ceiling where Zyklon B gas was dropped. The crematorium looked like a big oven. There, we sang a little and recited Kaddish.

The things that took place there completely defy all human logic, and because of that, it is almost impossible, without having been there, to comprehend what went on. It seems human beings should be incapable of this type of complete cruelty, but what we've seen over the past few days proves that they were, though I think that I still haven't really processed that fact.

I bought a book there, and then we went to Birkenau. We drove through a part of the camp, which was kind of strange, and started off where we had assembled the day before, at the end of the march. I barely recognized the place, because the day before, I was only able to see people, and none of the ground.

[written after the March, expanded from brief notes made during the March]

After wandering around the camp a bit, we gathered by what was left of one of the gas chambers for a ceremony led by Ramaz students. Matt led us in some songs with his guitar, including "The Butterfly." Afterwards, we filed in to the chamber to the haunting tune of "Eli, Eli". Mr. Meyer, a survivor who traveled with us, spoke, struggling through tears to get out his words. Next, Kaddish was recited by him at the chamber, the site of his mother's "grave". Afterwards, we left the chamber, again to the tune of "Eli, Eli". As we walked up the stairs, there was a strange feeling of guilt that hit me. Why should we be allowed to walk out of the chamber after a brief ceremony, when so many men, women and children left only as smoke through the chimney of the crematoria? Looking around, seeing the somber faces of my close friends, and even my mother, I realized that the only reason that we were standing around in blue jackets as opposed to marching, naked and hungry, to our death, was simply a freak accident of timing. Had I been born a few generations earlier, I wouldn't be able to do what was so easy for me in 1994: to walk out of the gas chamber in Birkenau.

In an understandably bewildered mood, I next went to confront a somewhat more personal bit of the past: my grandmother's barracks at Birkenau. My mother and I looked around the camp, trying make sense of a map of the barracks there. My grandmother had told us the number of the barracks where she stayed for some time in Birkenau, before making it out of the camp. After wandering around for a while, we found one that looked like it could have been the right one. The inside was cold stone, with wooden shelves for beds. I imagined my grandmother there, cold and cramped, among hundred of others. It was difficult to believe that all this was real, that we weren't in the middle of some nightmare or horror movie.

Finally, we left the camp and returned to the hotel for Shabbat. We were exhausted from all we had seen and done, and looking forward to Shabbat, in spite the fact that it would be spent in a country where we didn't exactly feel at home. We managed to enjoy a Friday night dinner in the hotel, with singing and all. Right next to us, there was a Polish wedding taking place. This was another reminder to us that life went on as usual, even in Poland. After dinner, we had a bus meeting in Rabbi Tom's room, where we all sat and discussed a bit of all that we had each seen and felt over the last few days. Eventually, after some singing, the meeting officially ended, but the conversation went on until early in the morning. I stayed up in my room until about 4 AM talking with friends from school about anything and everything that was on our minds.

[description of Saturday, April 9, 1994]

After finally collapsing sometime after 4 AM the night before, I slept until 1 PM on Saturday. Mati and I made it to lunch just in time to catch the very end of the meal. A little while after lunch, we took a walking tour around Krakow, along with some heavy security. We saw the Ramah shul there, along with some other sights. One incredible part of the tour was completely spontaneous: while we were walking through the main town square, drawing glances from all those we passed, there was a small band performing in the square, playing for donations. When they saw us passing, either because they were hoping for us to give them money, or because of their cynical sense of humor, they started playing Jewish music, like "Hava Nagilah" and "If I Was A Rich Man". At first, many of us felt uncomfortable, as if the entire square was saying, "Jews, you're not welcome here". After a little while, realizing what we had just been through, and to spite these people and their feelings, we began to sing and clap. Gradually, we formed a circle and danced a Hora right in front of the band. The music kept playing, and our dancing only got louder and more spirited, to the delight and amusement of those watching. We proudly danced and sang, showing that we had nothing to be ashamed of; that, on the contrary, we were proud. We eventually moved on with our walk, still on an emotional high. I doubt there are many people who can say that they've danced a Hora in the middle of the town square in Krakow, on Shabbos, and it was definitely a memorable experience.

After going back to the hotel and hanging out for a while, Shabbos was almost over. We went to Rabbi Tom's room for havdallah - Matt played guitar, and we sang a few songs. We stayed there and talked for a while afterwards in the room. Eventually, we went back and were talking by the rooms. We were leaving early Sunday morning, and I never quite got around to going to sleep that night.

later Sunday...

We left the hotel early this morning, and our first stop was the University/Yeshiva of Lublin. The place is now a medical center, though you can still see the cracks in the doorposts where mezuzot had once been. There, we had a siyyum, led by M.T.A. After half a century, we brought at least a small bit of Torah back to this place where many of the great minds of Europe had learned. This place was another example of the great level of Jewish life here that was lost.

Next, we went to Majdanek. The camp is nearly exactly the same as the way it was right after the war. After seeing a massive stone monument, we went through several exhibits, similar to the ones in Auchwitz.

Tuesday, April 12, 1994 - Yom Hazikaron (night) - Ramada Renaissance hotel, Jerusalem

I'm picking up here from Sunday... Towards the end, there was one building which held only shoes. The number of shoes was overwhelming. They were packed in metal grated holders. Going by slowly, I tried to fathom the fact that every shoe was a life, each one an individual with a story to tell. I reached out and touched one and tried to think about the person whose foot it once was on, and what his fate had been.

After finally leaving the room, I was ready for almost anything but what was in the next room. It was basically identical to the one I had just left. I had left the first room amazed at the number of shoes there, and now I saw that there were twice as many. Also in this room were some baby's shoes. The next room was full of more shoes, simply piled up several feet high. There was a wooden walkway over the shoes to get to the back of the room. This was so overwhelming that I felt like just falling into the shoes and going to sleep. Visually seeing all those shoes made the numbers somewhat more real, even though the number of shoes did not even approach half a million.

After walking a bit, we went into a gas chamber. These chambers were from earlier on in the war, when Carbon Monoxide was used, instead of Zyklon B. One seemingly minor detail that shows the sickness of the whole Nazi mentality is the fact that there were small glass windows on the door of the chamber so that the SS guards could watch as Jews were gassed. There was another building that had an exhibit on resistance.

The barracks at Majdanek were typical of those in the concentration camps, and were surrounded by a double electrified barbed wire fence, with another electrified section going diagonally in between the other two sections, so that no one could stand in the space in between the two fences. The most disturbing and frightening thing about Majdanek is that the city of Lublin was, and is, right there! The camp is literally in the center of a heavily populated area. Walking around inside the camp, we could see the skyline on all sides. Anyone with a balcony facing in the right direction could easily see exactly what was going on, never mind the smell of huge amounts of burning human flesh. There is really no way to deal with this on an intellectual level; it simply defies all rational explanation. Of course I had already learned days ago to put logic aside and try to accept the fact that what I was seeing actually did happen, hard as it may be to believe.

At another end of the camp was a tremendous monument. It was simply an enclosure filled with a hill, more than several times my own height, of human ashes. I spent a while just staring at the mound of black, trying to imagine how many people's lives were represented by this huge hill, seventeen tons worth of all that remained of the martyrs.

Near the monument, was another building, with a huge chimney. Inside were several different rooms, each with its own deadly purpose. One housed a large stone table where the gold fillings were removed from the mouths of the Jews. Another room was yet another gas chamber. There was a room that held a large glass box on display. Inside were intact human bones. Ironically, most of the people that were "processed" (to use the Nazi's own term) at Majdanek did not have even this much as their physical remains. The next room was a crematorium. There were nearly a dozen ovens set up in the center of the room, set up to dispose of those who had just been gassed. There was a washroom and shower for the SS officer right next door, so that while thousands of corpses were being brought in by the sonderkommandos and burnt, he was able to keep himself immaculately groomed. Many people just sat down and spent over an hour speechlessly staring at the ovens, crying, lost in thought and overcome by all they had recently seen. The building's huge chimney would have been rather obvious to anyone in the surrounding town, especially because of the fact that it spouted putrid-smelling black smoke around the clock.

On the grounds of Majdanek, there was another ceremony, this one led by Flatbush. Finally, knowing that we had now been through the most painful and draining part of the program, we boarded the buses to return to a different hotel in Warsaw, after having spent the last few nights in Krakow. After a long bus ride, we finally arrived at the hotel. After spending a while getting our bags up to our rooms, and (finally) eating, we had another bus meeting. The discussion went on for a while, and we all had plenty on our minds. Eventually, we split up for the night, our last in Poland. We spent a while playing cards ("Egyptian Rat Screw" soon became a bus 551 nightly tradition) and talking, and finally, even got a little sleep.

[description of Monday, April 11, 1994]

We woke up Monday, more than ready to go to Israel and get out of Poland already, but we had a full day before we were to go to the airport. We had a great deal to see, but compared to what we had just seen, it was a pleasant experience. Our first stop was the Rappaport memorial, a large memorial to those who fell during the Warsaw ghetto uprising. The monument was an imposing one, in the middle of a square in town. It portrayed the fighters heroically, with optimistic faces. From the memorial, we walked to Mila 18, the last building held by the fighters of the Warsaw ghetto, now just a rock atop a small hill, left as a tribute and memorial to those who fell in the uprising. Next, we boarded the busses and went to the Umschlagplatz. This was the site where countless Jews were deported, most of them ultimately to their death.

Our next stop was the Jewish cemetery in Warsaw. The cemetery, usually a very somber place, was actually one of the least depressing places we'd been to so far - after all, those buried here died largely of natural causes, and many had long and fulfilling lives. The most powerful part of the cemetery was its sheer size. This was another one of the many things we saw that gave us a sense of just how tremendous the Jewish community had been, both in numbers and in culture.

Nevertheless, we were in a very lighthearted mood, and were joking around in the cemetery, with even our bus leader chiming in. It was another of those moments that made sense only in the context of the previous week - only after the March could laughing out loud while surrounded by tombstones make some sort of sense.

The cemetery was somewhat run down, and we made a bit of an effort to fix some of the more neglected graves. I even saw a pair of tombstones that had a name that could have been a differently transliterated version of my own - they read "Kaftal".

Next, we went back to the hotel in Warsaw for dinner, our last in Poland. Myself and a few friends called school from the hotel - it was great hearing voices we hadn't heard in a while. Finally, we left for the airport, ecstatic to finally be getting out of the country. We all hung out in the airport for a while, with Matt and his guitar, spontaneously creating lyrics to songs to celebrate our leaving "P-O-L-A-N-D" and finally being on our way to Israel.

[description of Tuesday, April 12, 1994]

Arriving at Ben Gurion airport on Tuesday morning, I truly felt like I was home. Besides the pleasant change in weather, it felt as if the air itself was different. As amazing as this was for me, I kept thinking of how incredible it must have been for the many kids on my bus for whom this was their first time in Israel. I'd been excited to come, and, given the fact that I had been there a week earlier, and had spent a lot of time there before that, I was enthusiastically describing Israel to my friends who had never been there as if I owned the country. We soon left the airport, after meeting our new Israeli tour guides, and started on the road to Jerusalem.

Our very first stop in Jerusalem was not at the hotel to drop off our things and wash up, but at the Kotel. Tired as we all were, it was incredible to go straight from Poland to the Western Wall - I can only imagine what it must have been like for those who were at the Wall for the first time. Even though I'd been there plenty of times before, everything I was seeing and doing seemed different, being in the context of having just experienced Poland. One can only wonder how things might have gone differently if there had been a Jewish homeland at the dawn of the second World War. At the wall, we prayed, and I felt a tremendous connection to G-d and the Jews throughout history. With all the thoughts going through my head, I prayed with more intense concentration than I had prayed with in a long time.

After leaving the Kotel, we went to a nearby park to have breakfast. The weather, once again went right along with our mood. For the first time, the sun was shining brightly on us. Just sitting out on the grass, eating in the sun was more than enough to make us happy.

Following breakfast, we went to Migdal David (David's tower) in the Old City for a tour. I had seen the fortress-turned-museum before, so I spent most of the time just relaxing and sunbathing with a group of friends. We spent some time walking around the Old City itself - including passing by the place where I'll be spending next year, Yeshivat Hakotel. Even my non-religious friends were jealous of the opportunity I'd be having to spend a year in the Old City. We ate lunch in the Jewish Quarter, and then we were off to our next stop. This was a 200 year old Armenian Quarter house, which had been excavated. After walking through, we were given a lecture on archaeology. By this time I was nearly collapsing, and I took a much needed nap during the lecture. After this, we went back to the Kotel, to see the newly excavated tunnels there. There was a moving model of the Kotel in relation to the rest of the temple, and we walked down most of the length of the Western wall, which helped me imagine just how huge the temple had actually been. All in all, the day was interesting, but I was fairly exhausted, and had already seen most of what we saw, so I was more than happy to finally get to the hotel.

Finally, we checked in to the Ramada Renaissance hotel in Jerusalem. It seemed like paradise, especially after what we had been accustomed to during the past week. After a few free hours to wash up, unpack, eat, and relax, we headed over to Binyanei Ha'ooma, which was within walking distance, for a ceremony for Yom Hazikaron, which was Tuesday night/Wednesday morning. The ceremony brought the entire march together once again, and seeing everyone together in Israel, filling up a huge conference center to pay tribute to the Israeli soldiers who fell during the past half-century, lent a feeling of completion, of the circle somehow being closed. The ceremony was excellent, and afterwards, President Weizman addressed us. At the end, Hatikvah was sung. The involuntary association of this time with the one just a few days before standing atop the crematoria at Birkenau was eerie. While very moving in its own right, it was all the more meaningful given the echoes of the Auchwitz ceremony.

Still moved by the ceremony, we headed back to the hotel for the night. I spent a few hours in the lobby, talking with friends. Some of the people I knew who were spending the year there also came to visit.

Wednesday, April 13, 1994 - Yom Hazikaron/Yom Ha'atzmaut

Today was Yom Hazikaron and tonight is Yom Ha'atzmaut. Since we got here, the weather has been incredible, and this continued today. We began the day at Ammunition Hill, which I had seen already. There, at 11 AM, the siren sounded and the entire nation came to a halt. This was an amazing moment. Unlike in the US, everyone here truly has a personal connection to the soldiers, as well as a real love for the State..

From there, we went to Latrun, which I had also seen already. There, we saw tanks and a movie. We ate lunch at Canada Park, which was very nice. Afterwards, we went to Yad LaYeled, the children's memorial in Yad Vashem. We had a brief ceremony there. Next we went to Har Herzl, the military cemetery. After dinner, we went to Ben Yehuda street. Everyone was celebrating Yom Ha'atzmaut. People were walking around with spray confetti and toy hammers, "attacking" any random stranger in their path. Most of the night was spent in a combination of eating, drinking, dancing, having confetti wars, and generally just wandering around and having a great time. There was a feeling of camaraderie between everyone there, totally unhindered by the fact that people did not know one another.

[description of Thursday, April 14, 1994 - Yom Ha'atzmaut]

We began Yom Ha'atzmaut with a program at the Shalom hotel. We ate at the hotel, and danced in celebration. After a few hours there, we went to Palmachim air force base, for a special program.

Palmachim was the third time the entire march was together at the same place, at the same time, and this alone created an excited atmosphere. At the base, there were fighter jets, missiles, tanks, and other military equipment set up for us to look at. We went around with a guide and checked out the latest high-tech weaponry. After the tour, we had a special air show, performed just for us. We saw attack helicopters fly in formation and fire missiles right over out heads, hitting their targets, which we saw explode. They also performed search-and-rescue missions, finding and safely rescuing soldiers who were stranded in the woods, while at the same time, avoiding "enemy" fire. On a technical level, the show was completely amazing. It had even more impact, though, on an emotional level. Standing in Israel, on Yom Ha'atzmaut, seeing the power of the Israeli army, one of the world's greatest, filled me with pride. It made me appreciate just how far we had come since the Shoah.

After the air show, we gathered at another part of the base for a barbecue - for 4,500, not exactly your everyday cookout. By this time, it was already beginning to get dark, but we were far from tired. We went to an area of the base that had been set up with a stage and lots of chairs. There, we had a ceremony, followed by a concert. Several performers took the stage - the types of music ranged from Jewish, to Israeli, to American rock, and several types in between. It did not take long for us to get up on the chairs, singing at the top of our lungs and dancing, while the sky was filled with fireworks and a laser-light show. By the time the concert was finally over, we returned to our busses exhausted from a long and exciting day, but still on a great emotional high.

[description of Friday, April 15, 1994]

Most of Friday was spent in an Israeli high school in Lod. The kids there were very excited for us to come: they made had food for us, and made special signs. These kids were our own age, but had very different backgrounds. We spent some time there, and talked to the kids in the classrooms there. After our discussion, we went outside and played ball with them.

After the high school, a smaller group of us went to an Ethiopian school/absorption center nearby. We went around the kid's school, and met with them. We sat in a circle, and went around, each talking a bit about ourselves and our backgrounds, which varied greatly from each other. Interacting with these kids was very interesting, and it gave me a different perspective on my own life. Soon, we went back to the hotel to prepare for Shabbat.

[description of Saturday, April 16, 1994]

Shabbos, for a change, was relaxing and uneventful. We spent most of the day just hanging around the hotel, sitting out in the sun by the pool.

That night, we stopped by Ben Yehuda street for a little while, just long enough to eat and walk around a bit. From there, we boarded the buses to go to Masada. In order to get there before sunrise on Sunday morning, we would spend the night on the busses, driving down to Masada.

[description of Sunday, April 17, 1994]

We arrived at Masada on Sunday morning, well before sunrise. While it was still dark out, we saw a sound and light show there, which told the story of Masada. Afterwards, we set out to climb the mountain. Since it was still cool out, and we took the Roman ramp, the easier way up, climbing was relatively easy. Once up top, we gathered to watch the sunrise. It was a hazy day, and the sunrise was a bit of a disappointment, after all the trouble we took to be there. Anyway, next we davened, and gathered together for a quick history lesson. After that, we were left to wander the mountaintop at our own pace for a short while before climbing back down to the busses.

From Masada, we headed to Kibbutz Lochamei HaGeta'ot, a kibbutz started by Holocaust survivors, stopping for lunch along the way. The Kibbutz houses a large Holocaust museum, which we toured. The museum had a large collection of actual materials related to the Holocaust - Jewish art, Nazi paraphernalia, and models of the camps. After spending some time at the museum and hearing several speakers, we headed to the hotel.

We arrived at the Club Hotel in Tiberias, for what was to be our last night together. While we still had a full day of touring together the next day, we felt realized that this was the end of an incredible experience that we shared. We all gathered and talked for a long while in Tom's room. During the meeting, we gave Tom and Matt gifts which we had bought in Israel. Matt played for us for a while, while we sang along together. The last song was one he has written about the march, which mentioned the name of everyone on our bus. Eventually, the meeting officially ended, and we went to hang out in the lobby. Since sleep was not at the top of most people's agendas for the evening, we decided to go for a swim at 2 AM. After a while, we were "asked to leave" by a security guard. The rest of the night was spent just wandering around the hotel, talking with friends.

[description of Monday, April 18, 1994]

Our first destination on our last day of the March was the Old City of Zefat. We had a walking tour of the city, home to many kabbalists, stopping to see landmarks here and there, such as the Ha'Ari shul. Before leaving, we spent a little while looking through the shops there.

From there, we headed up to the Golan Heights. There, we went on Jeep rides through the area. There were six in each jeep, and we rode for a few hours, singing loudly most of the way. From there, we headed back to the hotel to pack up and prepare to leave. We were left with some free time to hang out in the hotel, before finally heading to the airport.

After checking in, en masse, we boarded the plane. The entire flight was spent signing people's books, taking pictures, and beginning to deal with the inevitable good-byes. We all felt a bit better about parting knowing that we all lived relatively close together, and that reunions were not too far off in the future. After my bags rolled off, I got one last goodbye in with friends, and headed outside to greet my parents.

Driving back from the airport, I felt like I had at least a year's worth of experiences to share with my parents, and my friends. It was hard to adjust initially to the day-to-day routine in the "real world" after what I had been through. It took a while to even begin to sort out the last two weeks, and the present was largely ignored. The march gave me a radically changed perspective on my world. Suddenly all my worries about college, the prom, and other assorted madness seemed not so terrible in the great scheme of things.

Another thing I felt in the weeks after the march was an incredible bond with all those who I'd been on the March together with. It seemed like only someone who had been on the March could understand my thoughts. Naturally, I was bombarded with questions after coming back, and I often found myself at a loss for words to describe the past two weeks. Much as I desperately tried to give my friends some idea of what I had seen and felt, I knew that no matter how much I tried to explain to them, no matter how many pictures I showed them, nothing would ever come close to the experience itself.

One thing that I did realize was that we must make sure to remember all that we saw and heard. Simply remembering, though, is useless unless we do something about it. Unfortunately, the last generation of survivors is slowly dying out, and soon there will be no one who can claim to be an eyewitness to the horrors of the Holocaust. While we may not have been there at the time, we, those who have been to Poland, are among the very few who can testify to what remains of that era. We can relate the stories of the survivors with whom we spoke and describe the sights which we saw. As members of this tiny minority who have seen the evidence first-hand, it is our obligation to tell the world about all we saw. Our obligation of remembrance is best fulfilled through education. Only by teaching the lessons of the Holocaust can we hope to prevent similar tragedies from occurring in the future.

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