Day 5: Where are your keys?

When you go on vacation, do you leave your keys with a neighbor to take care of your pet/mail/plants/home while you’re away? Perhaps you carry some pictures of your loved ones in your wallet, but now with mobile devices not so much.

On the walls of the Great Synagogue of Sejny are the keys that Jews deported to the ghetto, left behind hoping they would return home one day. You know what else is on the walls? Photos. And 800 NAMES.

We stood on the ground where another Synagogue was burnt to the ground with Jews worshiping inside. The fire quickly spread to the neighboring houses and local streets. 2,000 perished.

My students always ask, “why didn’t the Jews fight back?” Well, they did. There was armed resistance in Bialystok as in other ghettos, but always at a great cost. Partisans were outnumbered by Nazis, had to be aware of traitors in the community, and the Nazis would seek revenge by killing those left in the ghetto. There were SO many reasons why they were doomed from the start, but persisted anyway.

Jews made up 80% of the population in Bialystok prior to German occupation. How many today? ZERO

Without a doubt, Jews had a rich cultural history prior to WWII and fought with all their might to keep it alive.

The Great Synagogue of Sejny, Poland. 

Now serves as a cultural center where children play Klezmer music concerts.

Inside the synagogue. So many keys. People left them behind, so they could return to their homes. Heartbreaking.

800 names listed on the walls. 

Photos of loved ones left behind.

The Great Ludwika Zamenhofa.

Monument to the 2000 Jews burned in the Great Synagogue of Bialystok.

An artistic expression of the dome that survived the fire. Notice the Star of David. 

In a town where 80% were Jewish, there are NONE left in Bialystok today.

Monument to the Great Ludwika Zamenhofa

A monument in Esperanto language.

Town Square, Bialystok, Poland.

We are singing Yiddish songs on the bus with this great book put together by Lisa Kassow, Professor Kassow’s wife. Their daughter, Miri, leads us in song with her beautiful voice.