Holocaust Memorial Day in the UK

Jan 27th marks the official commemoration, with activities being held across the country tonight on the 26th due to the Jewish Sabbath tomorrow.

I wrote about my experiences attending a similar event while in Germany a few years ago.

Tonight's programme was organised by a local council, together with the local Jewish council. It was two hours in length and reservations were required with a strict start time. It was not highly publicised around here, but I left a reservation request yesterday in the odd chance that I could get in, fortunately, as I was only one and there was a cancellation, I was accepted today.

It was a full programme with multiple speakers:

• an introduction and background on the formation of the event, with partnership between government and the local Jewish organisation
• a view of the world today, and where we've come since last year's event
• the main speaker: an Auschwitz survivor who came to the UK when he was 16, he was the only one left in his family. He mentioned, the children were being sent away at the end of the war, if they wanted to go, as he had no reason to go back to Romania, he left. Another boy in the village went to find his brother but came back too late and missed the ship to the UK. The next ship that left went to the US, so he finally caught up with the two brothers after 50 years.
• a musical selection, playing pieces written by Holocaust victims
• a candle lighting ceremony
• closing remarks

I found this evening interesting on a few points:

1. There were only a handful of teenagers, perhaps five. There were no young people like at the similar German event. The teenagers were obviously the grandchildren of someone who was attending. I was a bit out of place, there was no one from my age range (30-40). I'd estimate 90% of the people were late 60's-70's, with the remainder immediately above or below that range.

2. I found it interesting, there was a big mention of 'current day Holocausts', Rwanda was mentioned a few times, along with Sudan and there were some posters at the entrance on the same topic. Slightly different than similar events that I attended in the US or the one in Germany where modern day events maybe received a one line acknowledgement. Then tonight, I read this piece from a few years ago on the BBC, and it started to make more sense, this emphasis.

3. An older woman sat down next to me and starting chatting. During the conversation she starting asking me if there is a large Jewish population locally, then I realised, the assumption was that I was there because I was Jewish, not necessarily because it was a community event. I stopped on the way out to look at some of the items in the display cases (an American flag caught my eye), and a local councillor stopped to chat with me and I mentioned not previously having a chance to see all of these lovely items, and yes it was a wonderful programme, etc. and he offered that I'm always welcome to visit when council is in session although it can be quite dry. He then starts to tell me about some history show they had on last night in anticipation of the commemoration today and asks if I've seen it?

H: 'No sorry, I have no television.'

Councillor: Ah, of course you wouldn't, I should have known that!

H: (Puzzled. My American accent usually causes all sorts of cultural thoughts in the heads of others, so I usually just roll with it.)

Councillor: Growing up, we lived near a Jewish family, I always liked them, and on and on.

So I then made the connection that he's thinking because I don't watch TV I'm Jewish. I then immediately thought of the Amish who don't watch TV. Thankfully, someone came over to chat with him at that point, because I now had the Amish stuck in my head and was having information overload trying to sort out all of these thoughts.

All in all, it was a well run programme with around 100 in attendance.

Friday night: Kristallnacht remembrance in Germany

On Friday night, Nov 9 (the anniversary of Kristallnacht) we went to an evening program of a local church. Neither of us have any affiliation with this church, nor do we know of anyone who attends this church as it is not near where either of us live, but rather it's near the office. However, it was also noted in the local newspaper in advance, so we went.

The evening started with an overview of the number of children in the Cologne Jewish school before Kristallnacht and then today, and then an introduction of the main speaker whose name is Henry. He started off by telling us that he was born in Cologne and about his early childhood years of playing soccer in the streets of Cologne Ehrenfeld with his friends. However, all of that changed one day when his Catholic friends told him that he could no longer play with them.

On the actual night of Kristallnacht he remembers (the SA or SS, I missed which) came to his house. They threw the family's furniture out the window. He remembers their neighbors just standing there and watching, not saying anything. At this point there was a musical break, and a pianist played something from Bach.

Fortunately, he was sent on a Kindertransport to the UK where he made many friends. At the end of the war, these friends scattered around the globe: to the US, Canada, Israel, etc. His sister was a bit older so she didn't get to go on the transport, and was killed in Auschwitz. Around this part my German started to go downhill, so I missed a bit as to what he did next, beyond stay in the UK. However, he decided to return to Germany 35 years ago, and both D and I missed his reason for coming back then.

Next the Jewish choir from D'dorf sang with piano accompaniment. There were some short readings after that by children in the local school, who went in pairs to read some historical data. Then Henry came back and had a scripted interview with two of the children who asked him such questions as 'do you hate the Germans for what they did?' (the answer was no). Finally, the choir sang again a few songs, but this time in German, with a closing song in in Hebrew or Yiddish, inviting the audience to join in the hand clapping.

The evening closed with the church leader (I think), thanking each group for their contribution to the evening while the audience continued to clap during his two minutes of thank yous. As the crowd filed out, there were two unattended baskets at the exit where people could give money. Having come from the Catholic tradition, there are plenty of baskets for money, but never unattended where I come from. I was further surprised that there were large bills in the unattended baskets, such as 50's. The choir had a bus waiting to ferry them back to D'dorf.

Overall it was an interesting Friday evening. There were perhaps 200 people in the audience, and only 2 people left during the entire evening. We lingered a few additional minutes to read some of the materials they had posted on the walls. They had some local histories of other people who were in this Cologne school and who had also gone on the Kindertransport, and what had happened to them since. Most featured were now living in Israel. They also had some historical info on the school, before/during/after Kristallnacht.