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June 1, 2001
Ruth Segal
Honors pile up for Sigal Jewish woman of distinction is fêted for
life's work.
PAT JOHNSON REPORTER
The morning after the Women of Distinction Awards ceremony, Ruth
Sigal was at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver, trying
to drink coffee but being regularly interrupted for hugs of congratulations
and showers of communal naches - pride that a friend and
colleague was getting the recognition she deserves. On May 17, Sigal
won the life achievement award for her quarter-century of work with
the University of British Columbia's Women's Resource Centre, as
well as for her roles as a founding member of the Vancouver Crisis
Centre and of a suicide research program at Vancouver General Hospital.
Under her guidance, the Women's Resource Centre has grown from a
volunteer staff of seven, helping 200 people a year, to an army
of 60 dedicated volunteers, helping some 25,000 people a year with
personal growth and career development.
But those are not all the kudos Sigal is receiving these days.
Her work on campus was recognized earlier in the month with UBC's
President Service Award for Excellence. Then, on June 3, Sigal is
to be honored with Grace McCarthy at the annual Rainbow Luncheon
of Jewish Women International.
"It's like Ruth month," Sigal quipped.
The honors are welcome, she acknowledged. Being called up before
1,200 people at the Women of Distinction event provided more of
a thrill than she thought it would.
"First of all, I didn't think it mattered at all," she said of
her nomination. Once at the ceremony, though, there was an energy
that built throughout the evening.
"I didn't think I'd be so excited," she said. The next morning,
still receiving accolades from people who saw her in the morning
paper, Sigal is reining in her excitement and getting back to business.
Her only complaint is that the term "life achievement" has a ring
of finality to it.
"I've definitely not stopped achieving," said the 64-year- old
Sigal.
Her professional life at the Women's Resource Centre has intermingled
with volunteer work over the years, all of it dedicated to helping
the human condition in one form or another.
Liaising with the university, Sigal has created three certificate
programs, specializing in peer counselling, cross-cultural counselling
and working with an aging population. She is also developing a program
to aid new widows, in conjunction with the UBC School of Nursing.
On top of that, Sigal is involved in a program in conjunction with
the Holocaust Education Centre to teach Holocaust survivors how
to help other survivors using a peer counselling model.
Then there is an effort to teach people in the Downtown Eastside
to counsel peers on issues such as single parenthood, drugs and
other social issues facing that population.
"I believe that each one of us has a seed inside us and all you
have to do is water it," Sigal said of her philosophy.
As a Holocaust survivor herself, Sigal has a particular empathy
and a need to make a contribution in the world.
"I feel that I need to help people, especially people who are underprivileged,"
she said.
Sigal's life began in Shavel, Lithuania, and some of her earliest
memories are of the ghetto life enforced by the Nazi overseers of
the Baltic state. When she was seven, the Nazis rounded up the children
of the ghetto, including Sigal's two-year-old sister, who never
returned. Young Ruth was hidden with a Christian family for the
duration of the war and still maintains a relationship with the
mother of the family.
During this time, she assumed her parents were dead. Yet, at the
end of the war, they miraculously arrived to reunite the remaining
family. They lived for a time in a displaced persons camp where
Sigal's younger brother was born, then moved to Munich, where a
Hebrew-language school was set up for child survivors.
In addition to her other endeavors, Sigal has managed to trace
down a dozen alumni from that school and is organizing a reunion.
Sigal's family made its way to Canada in 1951, living in Montreal
and Regina before settling in Vancouver, where her mother taught
generations of local children. That dedication to learning and nurturing
was instilled in Sigal, and she carries it like a welcome obligation.
"We understand the pain of children," Sigal said of herself and
other child survivors. "If you don't make it as a child, you never
make it."
Sigal was the co-founder, with Lillian Boraks-Nemetz, of a local
organization for people who were hidden as children during the Holocaust.
She also works extensively in schools and at the university to educate
people about the Holocaust and about discrimination and racism in
their larger contexts.
As a young immigrant to Canada, Sigal had a rough time, especially
with one UBC professor who told her that her English was so poor
she had no business being in university.
"I went home and cried my eyes out," she said. But a friend convinced
her to give it another try with a more sympathetic professor and
she excelled, eventually completing a degree in microbiology and
chemistry and becoming a medical researcher. After a decade, she
returned to UBC and received a master's degree in counselling psychology.
Sigal acknowledged that she has been lucky to be able to dedicate
her life to meaningful work. However, despite all her recent honors,
she is nonchalant about her contributions.
"I get up in the morning. I do my work," she said.
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