Day 9: Kolin

Day 9:  Kolin

Finally, we arrive at our destination.  Kolin is a small town with a population of about 30,000, approximately 60 km east of Prague.  It was at one time a center of commerce in east Bohemia.  The earliest gravestones in Kolin predate those in Prague by a few years and certainly Jews lived in this area continually for six or seven hundred years before being uprooted during the Shoah.

After an hour drive and a short walk we entered what was the Jewish ghetto. While much has been renovated, there were signs of what the ghetto must have looked like, dingy, dirty and grey.  We walked along the main road through the ghetto to the main square - which has clearly gone through some fixing up of its own in in recent years.







After orienting ourselves we entered a building which led, through the back, to the synagogue.  Here we were!  This is the place where our Torah resided for, perhaps, 250 years!  What an amazing feeling to be standing in that place.  Our host, a young non-Jewish man, who is in charge of tourism in the city ... and therefore, over the synagogue as well, told us all about the synagogue in Czech while our guide translated.  He is clearly very proud of the synagogue and even locked his office for 'lunch' so he could spend as much time with us as we wanted.  Our tour guide Kamila was very impressed with the restoration work that has been done since her last visit here 7 years ago.

We then joined together in a memorial / dedication service.  At the encouragement of all, I stood where centuries of rabbis had stood, where very few rabbis have stood since 1942. After a few readings I asked everyone to join me on the bima in front of the open ark as we placed there a beautiful book containing pictures and descriptions from our Torah renewal project this year.  (Thank you Rabbi Shawna and Isaac!)

What an incredibly powerful moment, to be standing in front of a now empty ark, where our precious little Torah lived for so many years ... and to place there a remembrance of our being there and of our community's sacred work over this past year to make that Torah once again a living, vital part of a Jewish community.  

Following tears, pictures and a shehechayanu, we moved upstairs to the ladies gallery to view an excellent exhibit about the history of Jewish Kolin and environs.

While we were there, the sun broke through for the first time during our stay.  It was as if the community we were coming to honor and remember wanted to make sure we were appropriately welcomed.

All in all we spent a great deal of time in the sanctuary and it was only with some reluctance that we left this place we had been looking forward to seeing for so long.  The good news is that the Synagogue has been restored, it is a center for concerts and communal events ... and next year, in early June will host a memorial to the 70th anniversary of the deportations.  So, there is still a chance that you might also visit!

We walked back to the square where we were guided by the young man from the tourist office to 3 locations on the town square where brass plaques in the sidewalk mark the location where Jewish families lived prior to their deportation.  One thing is quite clear from the location of these three families, directly on the town square.  Jews were a very prominent and important part of the community prior to World War II.  This important project is one in which I hope we will participate, helping to memorialize the Jewish history of this town and remind all who come of those who were brutally taken and lost from the community.

Following a picture on the town square most of us made our way to a newly opened Pizzeria in a corner of the town square ... to relax for a bit, take advantage of free wifi, and enjoy some very good pizza.

Then it was off to the new Jewish cemetery.  Here members of the Jewish community began to bury their dead following their exit from the ghetto.  In other words, in this part of the world, anything existing only since the American Revolution is 'new'.  We visited a memorial build and dedicated in the early sixties to the lost members of the community.  Here we each found the names of those we had been carrying with us over the course of our journey.  We joined together once again in a brief memorial, each reciting the names of those we had carried before joining together in kaddish.

The 'new' cemetery has quite a bit of open space remaining ... but no Jews left to be buried in this sacred space.  I couldn't help but think that these names, all listed together on one memorial, should rightfully, each eventually, had their own plot in this land that will remain unused.

After some quiet viewing of the cemetery, we boarded the bus and bid farewell to Kolin.  After so much planning and so much anticipation, it is hard to believe that this moment we had all looked forward to for so long had now passed.  Of course there is still more to come ... but this was the impetus and now our task has been completed.  We went, we prayed, we remembered.  We will carry the memory and the names with us forever.

zichronam livrachah ... may the memories of these precious souls remain a source of inspiration and blessing for all time.



Tomorrow:  Terezin and a visit with Irene -- a survivor from Kolin.

Day 8: Prague

Day 8:  Prague

Today we toured the Jewish quarter of Prague.


We spent the morning learning about the ups and downs of the Jewish community of this beautiful city.  Like all such communities, with apologies to Dickens, there were the best of times and the worst of times.

The earliest grave markers in the cemetery are from the early 15th century, but clearly the Jewish community was here earlier ... perhaps as early as the 10th century.  Like all communities in Europe the Jews came to Prague at the bidding of the local rulers, who hired them to be their money lenders and tax collectors.  (Something, of course, which which greatly endeared them to the local population ... who already considered them the murderers of their Lord)  

Prague is probably best known as the home of the Maharal, Rabbi Judah Loew, a rabbi of great intellect and erudition.  He was a great Judaic scholar and a master of mystic texts ... and the creator of the Golem.  The legend is that the Maharal created the Golem, with God's help and instructions to protect the Jewish community in times it was under attack from the surrounding community.

We toured 4 synagogues, two of which remain working synagogues and two which now simply serve as museums.  In each of the synagogues are displayed articles of the precious legacy.  Prague was the collection point, of course, for the Judaica from around the Czech Republic ... to store it and protect it during the Nazi occupation.  This is the story of our precious Torah although the synagogue in which the scrolls were stored is not in the city center, so we did not visit that location.  But we saw beautiful Judaica that, ironically, as perhaps was evilly intended, now is displayed as a legacy of a community that used to be.

Tags can be found on much of the Judaica, identifying the individual family, or community from which it came ... and remaining sadly for people or communities that no longer exist to return and claim them.

The "Pinchas" synagogue has been turned into a memorial to all Jewish/Czech victims of the Shoah. Along its walls are painted the names of each victim, listed first by city or town and then alphabetically within each town.  We found the city of Kolin and witnessed the names of all those lost  from the town of our precious little Torah.  On the second floor of the synagogue is a moving exhibition of the artwork of the children of Terezin.  An art therapist, imprisoned in Terezin worked with the children to help them to deal with their horrific life experiences.  The artwork survives as testimony to the horrors of Terezin (contrary to the Red Cross report of the time) and to the children, deported to Auschwitz only months after the Red Cross reported on the exemplary living conditions of the Jewish community imprisoned at Terezin.  (In fact, the Germans did such a great job of deceiving the Red Cross, that they found no reason to move on to the next camp they were to visit ... as they were told they would find a Auschwitz the same exemplary living conditions!)



Along the way we learned a bit about the Czech psyche.  Unlike Poland and Hungary, the Czech people are not very religious.  They are first and foremost Czech and atheist.  Most houses of worship are fairly empty as Czech's are just not interested.  Add in the destructive results of 40 years of oppressive communism and most people just want to live their own life.  Their is a strong unwillingness to get involved as it has been drummed into them the dangers of involvement.  One of the things that is clear is that communist rule hammered into peoples heads a great suspicion of each other.  With freedom that suspicion may have changed somewhat ... but only into a distinct indifference about others.  As our tour guide told us, it may take two or more generations to grow up in freedom to overcome the psychic damage incurred by 70 years of Nazi and them communist oppression.

Following lunch we walked to the Charles Bridge, the only bridge that connected the "lesser" city of Prague from the Castle district for hundreds of years.  In the middle of the bridge is a 16th century statue of Jesus on the crucifix surrounded by the words "kadosh, kadosh, kadosh, Adonai tz'vaot" (Holy, holy, holy is the God of hosts).  It was quite striking and a little disturbing to see the words of the "kedushah", the climax of our prayer service, surrounding the crucifix.  We were told by our tour guide that this is because this is one of the only places in the Jewish bible that seems to explicitly refer to the trinity (kadosh, kadosh, kadosh).  

The bridge is for pedestrian traffic only and the bridge is filled vendors and musicians and hundreds and hundreds of tourists.  It was another "Disneyland but for real" moment.

Some of us continued across the bridge to the Castle district side and did a bit of shopping, tasted some local treats and visited a graffiti wall dedicated to John Lennon (on which, at the very top of the wall I discovered LUTZ tagged onto the wall ... (I didn't do it, really).


In the evening we joined together for dinner in restaurant underneath the main music house, which is now having its annual music festival currently celebrating the music of Mozart and Dvorak.  We had a tasty traditional Czech meal ... and then headed back to the Hotel to rest and relax for our next day journey to Kolin.

Tomorrow:  our journey to our Torah's home, Kolin.

Day 7: Prague

Day 7:  Prague

5a.m.  Seriously!?  Yes, we were up, packed and out of the hotel by 6a.m. making our way to the Budapest airport where we caught a Malev Airline flight to Prague.

We were greeted in Prague by Kamila, our tour guide for the next few days ... a woman who, like Anni in Prague had many surprises of her own.  But, before going there, I might also mention that, while Northridge was suffering through 100+ temperatures, we encountered temperatures in the high 40s and rain for our first day walking tour of the Castle district of Prague.

We boarded the bus for a brief ride to the Castle district where neither wind nor rain stopped us from our appointed tour!  Clearly dragging, Kamila guided us to a most welcome site: a cafe where we could grab some coffee and tasty treats.


Re-energized we headed to a small shopping area which contained a house in which Franz Kafka once lived.  There, while making our way through this quaint little shopping area, we ran into TAS teacher Jackie Kovar and family who are making their own pilgrimage to Slovakia, where Jackie's father was hidden and survived the Holocaust.  It is an amazing story that he has shared with many of our students.  What an amazing thing to return to visit the home where he was hidden and meet the daughter of the woman who hid him and saved his life all those years ago.  And how wonderful and unexpected to run into her and her family here in Prague.

Finally, through more wind and even heavier rain we made the 40 minute trek across Old Prague to our hotel for some much needed rest as we have a busy few days ahead of us as we culminate our trip with a visit to Kolin in just two days.

The evening started with wonderful dinner with some great Czech beer thanks to our night life specialist Samantha who guided a few of us after dinner to an even great jazz club.  Unbeknownst to me, Prague is known for it's jazz clubs.  In fact Bill Clinton played his sax once at the club we visited.  (no jokes please!). Finally after roaming lost around the city we finally made it back to our hotel to rest up for the Fourth of July.  

Tomorrow the Jewish quarter of Prague.

Day 6: budapest

Day 6:  Budapest and Szentendre

Waking bleary eyed after a few hours of sleep, we headed off for a tour of the Hungarian parliament.  It is an amazingly ornate and impressive building.  A tour guide led us up a long flight of stairs to the center of the building where we visited the "Crown Jewels" guarded at all times by Hungarian guards.  We then walked down the hallway to the parliament, which seats 368 (I believe). It is a right wing government that rules with a large majority, joined by two even more extreme right wing groups ... including a fascist group that holds 13% of the vote.

Each step of the way we were followed by plain clothed security that made sure we stayed together ... commanding us to keep up with the group, should we stop to take a picture.

While truly impressive there was also something strangely ominous about all of this.  I had an uncomfortable feeling that it was not easy to shake.  Perhaps it is the grandiosity of the building itself?  Perhaps the plain clothed security following us around?  Perhaps the right wing government that, as our tour guide Anni would tell us later, was already invoking measures and making speeches that reminded her parents of 1938.

Anti-semitism, it seems, is never far from the surface ... even here, in the country in which the Jews were probably the safest.  Of course, following the viscous anti-semitism of Nazi Germany, there was the more tolerant, but also oppressive anti-semitism of the communist era.  And now, there is anti-semitism arising from blame being placed on the Jews for the 40 years of communist rule!  (Believe it or not ... after all, Karl Marx was a Jew ...)

Of course, when we returned to the bus and to Anni we learned what had not been mentioned by our Parliament guide, that the buildings architect was Jewish.  The hidden, unrecognized contributions of Jews to Budapest is truly amazing.  And what would become clear later, is just how frustrating this is to Anni ... not only that it goes unrecognized, but that the Jewish community is unwilling to stand up and ask for that official recognition.

Well, following our tour of Parliament we took off for the Castle District, for a quick tour of the Buda hilltop where this city began ... as a castle, cathedral and fortress.  

After a brief visit we headed off towards the small artist colony of Szentendre.  But on the way, we stopped for a brief visit to the Raoul Wallenberg memorial, located in a lovely park in the "Rose Hill" area of Buda, which was ... and still is today ... the traditional Jewish neighborhood of Budapest. 


Today, about 80,000 Jews live in Budapest, the third largest Jewish city in Europe following London and Paris.  On the way to lunch and the artist colony of Szentendre I had the opportunity to discuss the demographics of the Jewish community with Anni.  She noted that it is hard to tell just who is who and who belongs to what.  No one, she said, would 'join' a synagogue.  After all, that is how the Jews were rounded up by the Nazis ... by reviewing synagogue lists.  So, people anonymously support causes and Jewish programs of interest, but often, making sure that their names are not published, recorded, etc.  There is also little trust in the Jewish Federation of the community, which is still seen as a corrupt institution from the communist era, that can not be trusted to appropriately handle the funds contributed to it.  Rather, the respected organization in the community is the Joint Distribution Committee, run, Anni pointed out, by Americans and Israelis.

Arriving at Szentendre we made our way through winding narrow streets and alleys to the most marvelous of restaurants, "The Golden Dragon".  Now in America such a place would automatically mean, "Chinese".  But don't be fooled this was exquisitely prepared Hungarian cuisine in what is billed as the first privately owned restaurant in Hungary. (Opening in 1977) 

This "light" lunch, as Anni called it, consisted of a starter salad with mozzarella and assorted salamis, a beef broth soup with noodles, beef, vegetables and a quail egg.  This was followed by a goose breast prepared in a sweet au jus with sesame seeds, delicious mashed potatoes and sweet red cabbage.  Finally dessert, which I can only describe as a warm "matzah ball" of sweet cheese smothered in an amazing strawberry sauce.  Then to top it off ... espresso.  All I can say is 'wow'.  

We rolled out of the restaurant and made our way to the 'smallest synagogue' in the world.  Indeed the 14 of us plus Anni barely fit into the place.  It is impossible to relate the entire story here, but, Anni began to weave a most emotional story about the difficulties of the final months of world war two, the loss of the members of this small Jewish community and the building of this little synagogue as a memorial to them.  Only at the end of the story did we come to learn that this was not just any story, this was our tour guide Anni's story ... and this synagogue was her synagogue built by her and other family members in memory of her family and the other lost members of this community.  (Which, by the way, included a great uncle who founded Herend ... the well known Hungarian porcelain manufacturer.)

We then wandered the streets finding all sorts of treasures to bring home and boarded a boat to cruise back up to our Hotel on the 'blue Danube", which Anni noted, she has never seen blue!

Another lengthy day ended with a memorial service and reflection at 'The Line of Shoes".  On a high levee on the banks of the Danube, just a block from the Parliament is a memorial created by a non-Jew to the Jewish victims who were murdered by the Arrow Cross, a Hungarian pro-Nazi group in the final days of the war.  30 pairs of shoes, old, tattered and worn stand in silent testimony to what happened in this place in the winter of 44-45.  Here, Jews from the ghetto, randomly selected were brought.  They were ordered to remove their shoes and then a line of 10 or 15 was bound together with rope or wire.  As bullets were becoming scarce at the end of the war this war their evilly genius solution ... all bound together, one Jew would be shot.  As he  fell off the levee 15 or 20 feet into the freezing cold water of the Danube, the rest of the group, would be pulled in with him.  Many died instantly from the shock of the icy water, or succumbed to hypothermia as they floated as a group down the river.

Thankfully, down the river, there were those who would attempt to pull them out.  In this way, a few were saved from this evil scheme, including the elderly woman from whom we had bought beautiful Judaic treasures the day before.

For the third time we joined together in memorial and recited kaddish for our precious people.  Here, Anni noted, quite emotionally was an example of the problem that pained her so .... the memorial plaque at this place speaks of the murdered victims.  Conspicuously missing is the word "Jew".  When she asked the artist why this was the case he responded, "The Jewish community didn't want it there."  The Jews of Budapest, she noted are afraid to speak up ... and the official Hungarian community is unwilling to acknowledge that this was, in particular, a Jewish tragedy.  She noted the lack of official Hungarian participation in the memorial plaques at Dachau, where every other European country is listed.  Why?  and what will happen when there are none left to explain that ALL the victims remembered in the Line of Shoes Memorial were Jews?  Not just generic Budapest citizens.

We then spent a few moments in reflection about this first week ... all that we had encountered and all that we had experienced.

What an incredibly packed couple of days!  We headed back for dinner and to pack and prepare for a 5a.m. wake up call to catch a flight out of Budapest and on to Prague.

Day 5: Budapest

Day 5: Budapest

Day 5 began as we woke up in the very nice Sofitel Hotel in the Pest bank of the Danube.  Our  Budapest guide Anni took us first to the top of a Buda hill for the best overview of the city.

From there it was on to visit the Dohany Synagogue.  Why Dohany?  Because that is the street that it is on ... according to Anni the convention for most congregations in Budapest.  It is an absolutely magnificent structure that defies description here ... beautifully and ornately decorated AND the second largest synagogue in the world.  (Second to only Temple Emanuel in NY I believe).

There Anni told us the very sad story of Hungarian Jewry ... who remained mostly untouched until the last months of the war.  Because the Hungarians were German allies until the end of the war they were left alone (mostly because the Hungarian military was off fighting on the Russian front), and (for the most part) they left their Jews alone as well.

Even as the allies were occupying other parts of Hungary a ghetto was formed around the Dohany Synagogue and the Jewish of the city were rounded up and placed there.  In the meantime, Jews of the country side still under Hungarian/German control were also rounded off, placed in cattle cars and sent off to Auschwitz.  In fact, the last transports to Auschwitz were the Jews of Hungary and as we learned, any pictures you have seen of the Jewish victims in Auschwitz are of these Hungarian Jews. For some unknown reason, even as the Germans were losing the war and even as the SS was dismantling other camps and beginning to destroy evidence of what they had done, they allowed the documentation of these last transports to the death camp.

The Jewish community of the Hungarian countryside was virtually wiped out.  Thankfully, even though conditions in the Budapest ghetto were horrific and there were many, many brutal incidences and too many deaths and murder, the people of the ghetto were saved from final demise as the German's simply ran out of time and possibility to deport the residents of the ghetto.

As I said, this did not mean that there were not terrible times.  The courtyard of the sanctuary became a mass grave as there was no cemetery in  the ghetto It is now a memorial to all those who died in the ghetto.  

In a courtyard behind the Synagogue is another beautiful memorial to the Hungarian victims.  It is a silver tree that actually is an upside down menorah. The branches of the tree hold the names of the thousands of Hungarian victims.  The tree itself was funded by Tony Curtis (a Hungarian Jew) and by those who have bought leaves on the tree.

A good amount of time was spent browsing and purchasing lovely handmade Judaica, created by a (now) elderly woman, who as a youth had incredibly managed to survive a murder attempt by the Arrow Cross ... A Hungarian band of Nazi sympathizers who terrorized the city in the final months of the war.  (more on that below)

Leaving the synagogue we traveled to Andrassy Street.  Today, having achieved freedom this beautiful street has begun to regain some of it's pre-war and pre-communist era magnificence.  This street, in great measure, is why Budapest was considered the "Paris of the east".

Originally the street was built as an avenue leading from the Buda side of the city to the millennium exhibition, which was held in 1896 to celebrate the millennial birthday of the country.  

Lined by upscale stores the upper floors were often the apartments of the store owners.  And here's the little secret you won't learn on a normal tour of the city, most of the architects and residents of these apartments were Jewish!  Anni (her University studies in art and architecture) guided us through the buildings, noting the plaques in front of each building noting the date of construction and the (Jewish) architect and (Jewish)  residents.

The buildings are slowly being restored to their original beauty.  Having survived the war, these buildings did not survive communism.  As a symbol of the equality of all, the communist government painted the buildings, inside and out a dismal grey.  Moreover, glamorous apartments that had once been the residences of one family, were subdivided between several families.  Buildings that had once been the homes of 4 or 5 families became small apartments of 20-25.

Anni herself experienced this, watching the government order her family to share their apartment with 2 other families moved in from the countryside.  There was always the possibility that a member of one of these families might have been working for the secret police, and so, certain thongs were never discussed ... And in this way Anni's own Jewish identity was hidden from her, until in a burst of great pride following the 1967  war, her parents took her to the Dohany synagogue and revealed to her who she truly was.

Following our walk up and down the boulevard we returned to our lovely hotel to prepare for Shabbat.  

We were welcomed for Shabbat by Congregation Sim Shalom, a small Reform congregation.  The services were led by the Cantor as the rabbi was away with the youth group visiting London.  Following services we were joined for a "traditional Hungarian Jewish meal" at Rosenstein's restaurant by the Cantor, the Rabbis husband and two other members of the congregation.  The dinner was filled with lot's of calories and fascinating conversation with the members of Sim Shalom.  The Cantor, for instance is a charming young man who converted to Judaism.  He is now studying to be a Cantor with the "neolog" seminary in Budapest.  (Neolog is best described as Orthodox lite).  The rabbi's husband is an American physicist who was teaching at a university in Kentucky, when, on sabbatical he met his future wife when he attended services at Sim Shalom.  Another member of the congregation is a retired journalist.  It was fascinating to discuss with him what it was like to be  a journalist behind the Iron Curtain.  We were joined by another young woman who also had a fascinating story I am told ... but I didn't hear it so can't report it here.

So, you think this blog is long?  You should have experienced the day!

Totally exhausted from a looooooong day, we headed back to the hotel and to bed to catch a few hours of sleep before an early rise and visit of some more fascinating sites on Saturday.

A beautiful view of Buda from Pest

The ladies in old town Warsaw