{"id":31773,"date":"2019-02-01T03:57:15","date_gmt":"2019-02-01T11:57:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/?p=31773"},"modified":"2019-01-29T16:53:55","modified_gmt":"2019-01-30T00:53:55","slug":"emerging-from-terrible-abyss","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/2019\/02\/01\/emerging-from-terrible-abyss\/","title":{"rendered":"Emerging from terrible abyss"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Robbie Waisman and Dr. Uma Kumar\nspoke Jan. 24 at UBC\u2019s Hillel House. (photo from Hillel BC)<\/em><\/strong>
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

History\u2019s resonance in the present was a\nrecurring theme at a commemoration of International Holocaust Remembrance Day\nlast week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The event at Hillel House on the University of\nBritish Columbia campus, featured Holocaust survivor Robbie Waisman speaking\nabout his experiences in Buchenwald concentration camp and his life before and\nafter the Shoah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thirteen survivors of the Holocaust lit\nyahrzeit candles, after which Hillel\u2019s Rabbi Philip Bregman chanted the\nMourners\u2019 Kaddish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before Waisman\u2019s presentation, the audience\nwatched a 1985 video from CBC television\u2019s national program The Journal<\/em>,\nwhich followed Waisman as he traveled to Philadelphia to meet Leon Bass, the\nAmerican soldier who had liberated him from the camp 40 years earlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bass, an African-American, was the first black\nperson Waisman had ever seen. At the age of 13, Waisman thought Bass and his\nfellow American soldiers must be angels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIndeed, they were,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the event Jan. 24, which was co-sponsored by\nthe Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre, Hillel BC, the Centre for Israel and\nJewish Affairs and UBC\u2019s department of Central, Eastern and Northern European\nStudies (CENES), Waisman said the thing that kept him and his fellow survivors\nalive was the hope of being reunited with family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe enormity of the Holocaust was not yet\nknown to us,\u201d said Waisman. When it did become known, he said, \u201cwe had to find\na way to deal and cope with the huge loss of all our loved ones.\u2026 How are we\ngoing to live with all these horrors?\u2026 Has anyone survived? If not, what is the\npoint of my own survival?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He and his father had seen one of Waisman\u2019s\nbrothers murdered, and his father died later in the same camp. He would learn\nthat his mother and his other three brothers were also murdered, as were his\nuncles, aunts, cousins and friends. Of the family, only Waisman and his sister\nsurvived.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI search for answers,\u201d he said. \u201cI only find\nmore questions. How could anyone remain sane and functioning as a human being\nwhen humanity was destroyed in front of our eyes? Worst of all, how do you come\nto terms with the tragic loss of all our loved ones, fathers, mothers,\nbrothers, sisters, friends that we grew up with, all innocent \u2013 everything gone\n\u2013 how is it possible? We started questioning the existence of God. How could\nthis happen to us?… Before the war, we all came from Orthodox homes, rich in\nheritage and traditions. After coming out of the terrible abyss, the darkness,\nwe questioned angrily. But what we learned in the home, from our parents, was\nnot lost. The sense of humanity slowly returned to us. Our faith was shaken\nyet, in spite of it all, we remained true to it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Waisman said his experience in the Holocaust,\nand the experience of other survivors, has taught that \u201cevil must be recognized\nand that we all have a responsibility to make sure that it never happens again\nto anyone. And yet \u2026 what is the world doing about it now?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He reflected on the concept of \u201cNever again.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNoble, thought-provoking words, but only if we\nact upon them,\u201d he said. \u201cToday, over 70 years after my liberation, the promise\nof never again has become again and again. There have been a number of\nsituations that have tested the world\u2019s resolve, in Cambodia, the former\nYugoslavia, in Darfur and in Syria \u2013 I could go on and on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen I speak at high schools, I try to convey\nto students the pain of my experience in order to inspire them to prevent such\nevents from occurring again,\u201d he said. \u201cThe world must learn from the past in\norder to make this a better place for now and the future. We must teach\ncompassion, we must eradicate racism and religious persecution. We must teach\nourselves, teach our children, each generation must learn.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"photo
IHRD at Hillel, right to left, Michael Lee, Rabbi Philip Bregman, Robbie Waisman, Sam Heller (Hillel BC), Joyce Murray. (photo from Hillel BC)<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Also at the Jan. 24 event, Dr. Uma Kumar, a\nlecturer with CENES, noted recent reports that indicate many Canadians and\nothers are ignorant of the most basic facts of the Holocaust.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNearly half of Canadians cannot name a single\nconcentration camp or ghetto that existed in Europe during the Shoah,\u201d she\nsaid. \u201cHowever, there is a positive point: 85% of the respondents of the study\nsaid that it was important to keep teaching about the Holocaust so that it does\nnot happen again. Hence, there is a pressing need for more and better Holocaust\neducation at schools and universities in Canada. We, as Holocaust educators,\nstill have a lot of work to do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Joyce Murray, member of Parliament for\nVancouver Quadra, brought greetings on behalf of the federal government and\nalso reflected on her visit last year to Auschwitz.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Holocaust reality, for me, shifted from\nbeing a part of history that I thought I understood and regretted to a reality\nthat I feel in my body and in my heart,\u201d she said. \u201cCommemorating mass atrocity\nand genocide in the continued sharing of the story of survivors is a vital part\nof prevention. These stories serve as a reminder of the dangers of hate,\nprejudice and discrimination, the dangers of seeing human beings as \u2018us\u2019 and\n\u2018them,\u2019 the dangers of excessive nationalism to the detriment of others that is\nstalking so many nations today.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Murray also mentioned the Canadian government\u2019s\nrecent apology for refusing admission to passengers on the MS St. Louis in 1939\nand reminded the audience that Canada is not immune to bigotry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Michael Lee, member of the B.C. legislature for\nVancouver-Langara, was also present.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

International Holocaust Remembrance Day was\nofficially marked worldwide on Jan. 27, the date when Allied forces liberated\nthe Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camps in 1945. Another ceremony and a film\nscreening took place Sunday at the Peretz Centre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more about Waisman\u2019s Holocaust experience, see the Independent<\/em> story Feb. 28, 2014, at jewishindependent.ca\/holocaust-survivor-robbie-waisman-receives-national-honor<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Robbie Waisman and Dr. Uma Kumar spoke Jan. 24 at UBC\u2019s Hillel House. (photo from Hillel BC) History\u2019s resonance in the present was a recurring theme at a commemoration of International Holocaust Remembrance Day last week. The event at Hillel House on the University of British Columbia campus, featured Holocaust survivor Robbie Waisman speaking about […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":31774,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[3076,2791,53,8676,592,8675],"class_list":["post-31773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","tag-education","tag-genocide","tag-holocaust","tag-remembrance","tag-robbie-waisman","tag-uma-kumar"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31773","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31773"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31773\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}