Holocaust – Page 6

Commemorating the Shoah

Richmond RCMP Chief Superintendent Dave Chauhan, left, lights memorial candles with survivors David Schaffer, Sidi Schaffer, Amalia Boe-Fishman and Ilona Mermelstein, and Richmond Mayor Malcolm Brodie at a commemoration of International Holocaust Remembrance Day, at the Bayit, in Richmond, on Jan. 25. (photo by Pat Johnson)

Amalia Boe-Fishman was born in Leeuwarden, in the Netherlands, days before the start of the Second World War. Her mother’s parents and siblings had made aliyah to Israel in the early 1930s, but her mother, Johanna, stayed behind to pursue a career in nursing. Working in the Jewish hospital, she met Arnold van Kreveld, a patient who had been in a motorcycle accident, and they fell in love.

The couple married in 1935 and their first child, David, nicknamed Dik, was born in 1937. Amalia arrived Aug. 23, 1939.

“We had a good life, family, friends and neighbours,” Boe-Fishman said. But then, in May 1940, the German army invaded the Netherlands.

Boe-Fishman shared the story of her family’s survival at a commemoration of International Holocaust Remembrance Day, at the Bayit, in Richmond, on Jan. 25.

After the Nazis overran the Netherlands, her father’s parents and siblings were deported to Westerbork, a Nazi transit camp in the Netherlands, on Sept. 3, and on to Auschwitz, where they were immediately murdered, on Sept. 7.

Her father was a scientist and his young research assistant, Jan Spiekhout, a member of the Dutch resistance to the Nazis, would save the lives of the entire van Kreveld family.

“Jan Spiekhout found immediately an address for my father to go into hiding,” Boe-Fishman recalled. “He then found different hiding addresses for my mother, another address for my brother and then one for myself.”

Amalia was not yet a year old and her parents knew they might never see their children again.

“My mother gave me a special doll to keep me company and a letter I brought with me so my new family would understand her little girl a little better,” said Boe-Fishman. “In the letter, [she] told them how fond I was of my older brother Dik. If my parents would not survive the war, the Holocaust, to send us together to Israel to stay with one of my mother’s sisters.”

Amalia was taken to the home of Spiekhout and his parents, Durk and Froukje Spiekhout. The crowded and deeply religious Dutch Reformed household already had six children, of which Jan was the eldest. The younger Spiekhout children were told that Amalia was the daughter of a sick aunt in Rotterdam.

“They became my family,” said Boe-Fishman. “Father Spiekhout took a great risk bringing me into his household. He was a policeman. After all, policemen were supposed to work for the Nazis and round up Jews.”

She learned later that he instead warned Jewish neighbours of impending Nazi roundups.

“My father, typically Jewish looking, with dark hair, went from hiding place to hiding place – at least 26 different addresses,” Boe-Fishman said. “All at night and all arranged by Jan Spiekhout. My mother, not so typically Jewish looking, did not need to flee so often.

“As for myself, I don’t know what I remember or what I was told later on,” she said. “I was not allowed to go outside and I had to stay indoors for three years.”

On April 15, 1945, Canadian forces liberated Leeuwarden.

“What did that mean for me?” she asked. “Liberation should have been a really happy time for me. I was told that I could go outdoors. I didn’t know what to expect, what was waiting for me outdoors. Indoors had become my entire life. Indoors was where I felt secure and safe. Indoors was all I knew.”

Greater change was to come.

“I was told I had a real family and I was told I was going home,” she said. “But who were those people, who were those strangers? I did not want to leave the family Spiekhout. They were my real family and I loved them. My own father and mother were patient with me. They would come over to visit and I would run away or hang onto Mother Spiekhout screaming, ‘I don’t want to go home!’”

Dik, who was now 7-and-a-half, was also a stranger to little Amalia. Most incredibly, and at profound danger, a younger sibling had been born in hiding, a baby named Jan, in honour of the family’s saviour.

The name Jan has profound resonance in the family. Amalia’s oldest son, who joined her at the commemoration, was born in 1962 and is also named Jan.

That the entire immediate family had survived the Holocaust – had grown, in fact – was almost inconceivable. Dutch Jews had one of the lowest survival rates during the Holocaust. The van Krevelds owed everything to the Spiekhout family who, in 2008, were recognized as Righteous Among the Nations by Yad Vashem’s Holocaust Martyrs’ and Heroes’ Remembrance Authority. Boe-Fishman and her children attended a ceremony honouring the Spiekhouts in The Hague in 2009.

In 1961, Boe-Fishman (then van Kreveld) went to Israel trying to find her Jewish identity. The Eichmann trial was taking place at the time, which cracked open consciousness of the Holocaust not only for most of the world, but for survivors, including her family, who had remained almost entirely silent on the subject. In Israel, she met and married a Canadian Jew from Vancouver and settled here becoming, among other things, a devoted speaker to class groups and others about her Holocaust experiences.

photo - Amalia Boe-Fishman and son Jan Fishman. Boe-Fishman shared her survivor experiences at the memorial event — Amalia Boe-Fishman and son Jan Fishman. Boe-Fishman shared her survivor experiences at the memorial event. (photo by Pat Johnson)

Rabbi Levi Varnai of the Bayit contextualized Boe-Fishman’s presentation.

“I think that this year – every year, but this year maybe more than any year – with all the craziness in the world, this event is even more important than ever before,” he said.

Keith Liedtke, president of the Bayit, served as master of ceremonies and credited Michael Sachs, now regional director for Jewish National Fund of Canada, for starting the tradition five years ago of inviting the mayor to recognize Holocaust Remembrance Day annually.

Cantor Yaakov Orzech chanted El Moleh Rachamim. Richmond’s Mayor Malcolm Brodie read the proclamation and reflected on Boe-Fishman’s experiences. RCMP Chief Superintendent Dave Chauhan joined the mayor and survivors in lighting memorial candles. Liedtke read a message from Steveston-Richmond East Member of Parliament Parm Bains. Kelly Greene, member of the Legislative Assembly for Richmond-Steveston, brought greetings from Premier David Eby. Also in attendance were Richmond South Centre MLA Henry Yao and Richmond city councilors Chak Au, Andy Hobbs and Bill McNulty.

In addition to the Bayit, the event was presented with the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre, Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, Kehila Society of Richmond and Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver.

Remembering, learning

Hillel BC’s Holocaust Education Week takes place on campus at the University of British Columbia Jan. 29-Feb. 2. Every day of that week, there will be something going on to attend and learn from, including the exhibit from Yad Vashem called Shoah: How Was It Humanly Possible?, which will be on display the whole week.

photo - Rachel Mines — Rachel Mines (photo from Hillel BC)

Jan. 29, 6 p.m.: Unheard Echoes: Jews in Lithuania Before, During and After the Holocaust. Presentations about the Jewish connection to Lithuania throughout history, focusing on the Holocaust, by Rachel Mines and Gene Homel, two members of the Lithuanian community. Register at forms.office.com/r/s4uAFqv8gc.

Jan. 30, 6 p.m.: Unheard Echoes: The Far Reach of the Holocaust in Asia. Ryan Sun is a PhD candidate in the department of history at UBC, working with Prof. Leo Shin and Prof. Richard Menkis. His transnational project expands the geography of Jewish exile outside Europe and beyond Shanghai, and onto the British colonies of Hong Kong and Singapore. He is particularly interested in Jewish refugees’ ship-bound experiences, how transiting colonial port-cities and encountering local inhabitants informed their understanding of “the Orient,” as well as how these ship-moments disrupt the standard narratives of the Holocaust and survivor testimonies. Register at forms.office.com/r/aQx4LG2Fhi.

photo - Ryan Sun — Ryan Sun *(photo from Hillel BC)*

Jan. 31, 5 p.m.: In a partnership between Hillel, brothers of the AEPi chapter of Vancouver and Chabad UBC, there will be a reading of the names of those who were murdered in the Holocaust. Meet at Hillel, then walk over to the fountain at the main mall, where the reading of the names will begin at 5:30 p.m. The reading can also be joined online, live on Hillel BC Facebook and Instagram, as well as the Instagram page for AEPi.

photo - Marie Doduck — Marie Doduck (photo from Hillel BC)

Feb. 1, 5 p.m.: A Fireside Chat and Q&A with Survivor Marie Doduck & Dr. Lauren Faulkner Rossi. Marie (Mariette) Rozen Doduck was born in Brussels, Belgium, in 1935. She immigrated to Canada in 1947 as a war orphan with three of her siblings and settled in Vancouver. She is actively involved in Holocaust education and is a cofounder of the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre.

Rossi is currently researching child survivors of the Holocaust, the significance of their memoirs to Holocaust studies and the shared language of trauma among child survivors of different genocides.

Feb. 2, 5 p.m.: Students-only Shabbat Dinner with Honoured Guests: Holocaust Survivors will feature a candlelighting ceremony and survivors spread out among the dining tables with students. Students can register at forms.office.com/r/ayufQr3Zmy.

For more information or help with the registration links, email info@hillelbc.com or call 604-224-4748.

– Courtesy Hillel BC

Celebration of courage

A still from the documentary Passage to Sweden, which will screen as part of the annual Raoul Wallenberg Day for Civil Courage event on Jan. 21.

This year’s annual Raoul Wallenberg Day for Civil Courage gathering, on Sunday, Jan. 21, held at Congregation Beth Israel, will explore and honour civil courage in Scandinavia during the Second World War.

Just over 80 years ago, in late 1943, Danes, Norwegians and Swedes had to confront moral choices, when Denmark and Norway dealt with military occupation by Nazi Germany. Many people defied Nazi policies that threatened the human rights and lives of their fellow citizens and residents.

In Denmark, thousands of Christian Danes risked their own lives, cooperating in the dramatic, swift and secret rescue operation. The Jews, who faced deportation and certain death at the hands of the Nazis, were ferried to safety in neutral Sweden. Their homes and properties were safeguarded until their return after the war. Sweden welcomed and aided the Danish Jews, risking its own status as a neutral nation.

In Norway, the site of significant armed attacks by Nazi Germany, hundreds of Norwegian police officers refused the orders of Nazi occupiers, a collective action that led to their imprisonment at Stutthof concentration camp in Nazi-controlled Poland. There, the Norwegian police maintained their solidarity as they acted to reduce the suffering of their fellow prisoners, including many Jews, such as the late Jennie Lifschitz, who settled in Vancouver in the early 1950s.

Finland and the Baltic nations (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) were also engulfed in the war, victims of the Soviet Union’s military occupation and, in the case of the Baltics, annexation and mass civilian deportations.

While Nordic peoples, like most Europeans, were not completely free of hostility toward Jews and other minorities, they offer a good example of civil courage, based on the belief that Jewish citizens and residents were their equals.

This year, at the local Wallenberg Day event, Vancouver Holocaust educator Norman Gladstone will speak about the remarkable rescue of Denmark’s Jewish population. Local researcher and author Tore Jørgensen will speak about the hundreds of Norwegian policemen, including his father, who refused to collaborate with the Nazi occupiers. Historian Gene Homel will introduce the Wallenberg-Sugihara Civil Courage Society and the City of Vancouver proclamation of Wallenberg Day.

As well, the documentary Passage to Sweden will be screened. The film covers the wartime courage of Scandinavians, including Sweden’s Raoul Wallenberg, who acted courageously to protect civilians in Hungary, and was taken into custody by the Soviet army. His fate is unknown to this day.

The 19th annual Wallenberg Day on Jan. 21 at Congregation Beth Israel will be held at 1:30 p.m. Admission is free and donations will be gratefully accepted.

For more about the Wallenberg-Sugihara Civil Courage Society, which organizes the annual event, visit wsccs.ca.

– Courtesy Wallenberg-Sugihara Civil Courage Society

Pinsky pens family memoir

In his ambiguously titled book Ordinary, Extraordinary: My Father’s Life, Vancouver lawyer and community leader Bernard Pinsky shares the biography of Rubin Pinsky. As the pages turn, the reader realizes that ordinariness and extraordinariness really do describe the tale of a life that veers from historically monumental to surprisingly, and gratefully, commonplace.

At 1 p.m., Jan. 28, Pinsky will officially launch the book, in honour of International Holocaust Remembrance Day, at a prologue event to the Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival. He will present in conversation with Marsha Lederman.

Pinsky’s book is based on videotaped testimonies that his father, Rubin, gave in 1983 and 1990 to the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre (which is co-presenting the Jan. 28 event), as well as family memories and what is clearly intensive research.

Rubin was born (probably) in 1924, about 100 kilometres north of Pinsk in what is now Belarus but was then Poland. Pinsky sets the stage beautifully, evoking shtetl life, where the smallest of the children slept atop the bakery oven in the tiny home after his father, Baruch, had baked challah and cakes during the day to eke out a meagre living.

After the German occupation, the Nazis quickly identified the men in the Jewish community who had leadership qualities and said they were needed for an important mission in a nearby area. They were marched just out of earshot and mass murdered. In a later selection, Baruch, his wife Henya and 10-year-old Rachel were marched off and never seen again.

Rubin and his sister Chasia were deemed useful for forced labour and spared the executions. Older brother Herzl had earlier been conscripted into the Red Army.

Every survivor narrative includes a series of unimaginable interventions, coincidences and happenstances, often made possible by acts of incredible daring by the survivor. Through a series of audacious escapades – they weighed off what appeared to be likelihood of certain death with the faint hope of survival – Rubin, Chasia and a few others escaped a selection process and fled to the forest. They lived off berries, roots, tree bark and what small game they could capture. In one instance, Rubin slew a timber wolf in a competition for the same rabbit.

The group connected with a diffuse but apparently well-organized network of Jewish and other partisan fighters. Despite the challenges of mere survival, Rubin and Chasia participated in anti-Nazi actions that included cutting telephone lines, destroying railway tracks and undermining the establishment of Nazi garrisons.

Typhus swept through the Jews in the forest. In the winter of 1943/44, Rubin was delirious with fever and expected to die. In one of the terrible choices people were forced to make in such situations, the partisan cadre decided to leave him behind to save the group. Chasia refused to go. The two siblings hid in a ditch and, to the best of her ability, she nursed him back to comparative health.

Each of these unlikely survival stories makes one wonder how many similar stories did not have the relatively happy ending Rubin’s did, how many survivor testimonies or second generation narratives were never written because the fever did not break, or the hero did not take a risk on a faint hope, or any of a million chance escapes or saving miracles did not occur in time.

In July 1944, the forest in which Rubin and Chasia had hid, fought and barely survived was liberated by the Soviet army. Concentration and death camps were repurposed into displaced persons camps after the war and Rubin and Chasia were in Bergen-Belsen. Chasia left and searched for three weeks, eventually finding Herzl and bringing him with her to Bergen-Belsen, where the three surviving members of the family were reunited.

Zionists tried to recruit them to go to Palestine, but Rubin knew that would be a continuation of the conflict, uncertainty and fighting he wanted to put behind him.

“Rubin therefore made up his mind,” writes Pinsky. “He needed a skill or trade in demand in America. He and Herzl made a pact. They would study together, each in a different trade, and go together to the New World. They would help each other and never be separated again.”

The story of how Rubin and Herzl (in the New World, he would be known as Harry) were able to migrate to Canada is another example of chutzpah – an hilarious drama of subterfuge – that has to be read to be believed. Chasia, whose marriage in the DP camp did not last, joined them soon after.

Rubin married Jenny Moser in 1951 and they would have three children: the author, Bernard, his older sister Helen and younger brother Max – all now mainstays of the Vancouver Jewish community. Rubin’s life in Canada was that of a hardscrabble entrepreneur – and not without its seemingly miraculous near-misses and fortunate endings.

As an appendix, Pinsky shares writings from a 2012 family roots trip back to Gzetl, where a dedicated teacher is keeping alive the memory of Gzetl’s Jews.

Pinsky’s memoir is indeed a story both extraordinary and ordinary, of what human resilience can summon in a world turned upside-down – and how the strength developed in unimaginable adversity can carry a survivor through challenges when life becomes, in comparison, ordinary.

Register for the event at jccgv.com/jewish-book-festival/events.

Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas “visit” the Jericho Arts Centre

photo - Kelsi James as Alice, left, and Tanja Dixon-Warren as Gertrude in Gertrude & Alice — Kelsi James as Alice, left, and Tanja Dixon-Warren as Gertrude in Gertrude & Alice, by Anna Chatterton, Evalyn Parry & Karin Randoja. *(photo by Nancy Caldwell)*

Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas “visit” the Jericho Arts Centre to tell of their 40-year relationship, of friendships with iconic artists, of Alice’s overwhelming devotion to Gertrude’s genius and how, as two Jewish lesbians, they survived in Paris in the Second World War. They want to find out how their lives are – or are not – remembered.

Lois Anderson directs the United Players production at Jericho Arts Centre Jan. 19-Feb. 11. For tickets, visit unitedplayers.com/gertrude-alice.

– Courtesy Jericho Arts Centre

Danish rescue at 80

At the Nov. 9 Kristallnacht commemorative event, left to right: Dr. Janus Møller Jensen, Nina Krieger, Prof. Chris Friedrichs and Abby Wener Herlin. (photo by Rhonda Dent)

The rescue of Danish Jews during the Holocaust – an operation that mobilized almost the entire strata of Denmark’s population – is one of the bright lights in the history of that dark era. That extraordinary event, which took place 80 years ago last month, is one of the reasons Denmark had one of the highest survival rates of any country during the Shoah. Even this uplifting story, though, has its “shadows,” according to an expert who spoke in Vancouver Nov. 9.

Dr. Janus Møller Jensen, an historian and director of the Danish Jewish Museum, was the keynote speaker at the annual community-wide Kristallnacht Commemoration, presented by the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre and held at Beth Israel Synagogue.

Denmark has an unusual history in the context of Nazi occupation. After the Nazis invaded the country with minimal opposition, in April 1940, politicians and the king, Christian X, surrendered, but managed to negotiate terms that allowed the Danish democratic system of government to continue in a so-called “peace occupation.” Importantly, one of the Danish demands was that no Dane be singled out according to their race or faith, said Møller Jensen.

This status quo fell apart in 1943, after a series of strikes and uprisings around the country. Amid the Nazi crackdown came rumours at the end of September that an action against Danish Jews was imminent. At the same time, word spread that Sweden was prepared to accept Danish Jews as refugees. A mobilization of fishing boats began – as did the Nazi mobilization – in early October. Up and down the coast of Denmark, small and larger boats carried their cargo of Jewish Danes across the straight to neutral Sweden. In all, an estimated 7,220 Jews and 686 non-Jewish spouses were transported. Of all Danish Jews, 472 were captured by the Nazis and transported to Theresienstadt, in present-day Chechia, a waystation to the extermination camps. Of these, all but 53 survived the war, in part because the Danish government persuaded the Nazis to allow food and medicine packages to be delivered to the Danish inmates.

Another stunning reality was that, when the Danish Jews who survived – estimates of survival range from 95% to 99% – returned to Denmark, almost all found their homes and possessions intact – a stark difference from what Jews elsewhere in Europe discovered if they returned to their places or origin.

Not all of Danish history is so bright for Jews, said Møller Jensen. A long history of Catholic and Lutheran theological antisemitism permeates Denmark, and immigration policies before the Second World War prevented many Jews from elsewhere from reaching refuge.

“We have letters of refusal in our collection, of people who we know later died in the camps,” said Møller Jensen.

In addition, Danish companies and agricultural producers provided materials to the German war effort, although this was required of all occupied countries, he noted.

Not all rescuers acted on altruistic motives, either, Møller Jensen added. Some fishers took money to transport Danish Jews, but he also noted that, while hindsight suggests the Nazi occupiers turned something of a blind eye to the rescue operation, those involved at the time did not know this and would likely have assumed they were risking their lives.

photo - BC Premier David Eby spoke at the Kristallnacht event — BC Premier David Eby spoke at the Kristallnacht event. *(photo by Rhonda Dent)*

In addition to the hands-on rescue, Danish society rose up against the Nazis’ action. “Organizations from the entire strata of society – doctors, professors, students, lawyers, industries, working unions – protested,” he said. “The Danish church promulgated a so-called ‘Shepherd’s Letter’ to be read aloud in all of the churches in Denmark the following Sunday, stating that this was an unchristian act, that all people were the same in the eyes of God and that this was wrong and the congregation should assist and protect their fellow human beings…. One of the priests remembered, having read the letter aloud, that the entire congregation spontaneously rose to its feet and shouted ‘Yes!’”

Beth Israel’s Rabbi Jonathan Infeld thanked Møller Jensen and reflected on his words.

“The Danish people,” he said, “did exactly the opposite of what happened in Poland. When the Jews came back to Poland, they were murdered and their property was stolen, and when the Jews came back to Denmark, dinner was waiting for them on their tables. That is righteousness.”

BC Premier David Eby spoke at the Kristallnacht event, saying he wanted to provide assurances that all parties in the Legislature are committed to ensuring that the Jewish community in British Columbia is protected from antisemitism and feels safe. He acknowledged the proximate anniversaries of Kristallnacht and Remembrance Day, and noted that his government had just announced that Holocaust education will become mandatory in the BC school system.

“The thing about remembering is you can’t remember something you’ve never learned, you can’t remember something you were never taught,” Eby told the audience. “I’m proud to stand with you, to support your community, to stand against antisemitism, to stand against Islamophobia, to stand against all forms of hate, for British Columbia to be a beacon of hope in the world of what is possible at a time when those who want to promote division and hate seem to be on the rise just about everywhere. We have lots to be proud of in this province and part of what I’m incredibly proud of is the strength of our Jewish community here and I’m very honoured to be with you here this evening.”

Before the keynote address, Prof. Chris Friedrichs, emeritus professor of history at the University of British Columbia, contextualized Kristallnacht and called the Danish rescue “the most spectacular episode of rescue in the entire history of the Shoah.”

The Kristallnacht gathering was presented in conjunction with Congregation Beth Israel and funded by the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver, with support from the Robert and Marilyn Krell Endowment Fund of the VHEC. Møller Jensen’s visit was facilitated by Norman Gladstone and Birgit Westergaard.

Corinne Zimmerman, president of the board of the VHEC, introduced a procession of Holocaust survivors, who carried memorial candles. Nina Krieger, executive director of the VHEC, opened the event and read greetings from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Cantor Yaacov Orzech recited El Moleh Rachamim. Councilor Sarah Kirby-Yung read a proclamation from the City of Vancouver. Taleeb Noormohamad, member of Parliament for Vancouver Granville, sent video-recorded greetings from Ottawa. BC cabinet ministers Selina Robinson and George Heyman were in attendance, as was Michael Lee, member of the Legislative Assembly for Vancouver-Langara.

The event drew a record crowd, according to organizers, of 420 in-person attendees and an additional 120 watching via livestream, including groups at the Louis Brier Home and Hospital and the Weinberg Residence.

Students to learn of Holocaust

BC cabinet minister Selina Robinson speaks Nov. 5 at Schara Tzedeck Synagogue. Other panelists at the B’nai Brith Canada event that day were, left to right, Schara Tzedeck’s Rabbi Andrew Rosenblatt, BC United MLA Michael Lee and Aron Csaplaros, BC regional manager for B’nai Brith. (photo by Pat Johnson)

British Columbia is to become only the second province in Canada to mandate Holocaust education in the school curriculum. In a surprise announcement at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver on Oct. 30, BC Premier David Eby was flanked by Jewish community leaders and survivors of the Holocaust when he said that Grade 10 students will be required to learn about the Holocaust, beginning in the 2025-26 school year.

Until now, it was possible for a student to graduate from the school system in British Columbia without ever having encountered the subject. Teachers have discretion to include the Holocaust in social studies classes and an elective on genocide is available in some schools, but there was no universally mandated requirement for learning about the Shoah. Ontario recently instituted mandatory Holocaust education at the Grade 6 level, becoming the first province in the country to make the subject compulsory.

Speaking at an event on Nov. 5, BC cabinet minister Selina Robinson recounted how the milestone decision unfolded. She credits former BC education minister (now minister of transportation and infrastructure) Rob Fleming with launching the idea in 2018. Fleming came to Robinson and asked if she knew that Holocaust education was not mandatory.

“Just like many, many others, I was surprised to learn that,” said Robinson. “He started the ball rolling.”

The COVID pandemic derailed the plans, as educators and administrators struggled to simply deliver learning to kids.

It was while reading Vancouver author Marsha Lederman’s book Kiss the Red Stairs that Robinson, who is the province’s minister of post-secondary education and future skills, wondered what had happened with Fleming’s idea.

“So, I picked up the phone and I called Rachna [Singh, the current minister of education] and then I called Rob Fleming and then I called a couple of my other colleagues who had an interest in seeing this move forward,” she recounted. “And then I called the premier and I said, David, this project that we started is moving at a snail’s pace and this needs to get done. We cannot wait any longer. I want to give kudos to our premier, to David Eby. He said, I’m on it.”

Robinson was speaking at Schara Tzedeck Synagogue on Sunday as part of a panel on antisemitism and Holocaust education organized by B’nai Brith Canada. Numerous members of the legislature, as well as mayors, councilors and school trustees from around the province joined the event virtually. Robinson’s fellow panelists were BC United MLA Michael Lee and Schara Tzedeck’s Rabbi Andrew Rosenblatt. Aron Csaplaros, BC regional manager for B’nai Brith Canada, moderated, with senior leaders from B’nai Brith beaming in from Eastern Canada.

From Robinson’s post-COVID jumpstarting of the Holocaust education planning, things leapt forward, she said.

“It really moved, I would say, from June until probably the beginning of September, at lightning speed – and anyone who’s ever had to work with government knows that nothing ever moves at lightning speed,” Robinson said. “So, I want to give kudos to our partners at the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre and CIJA [the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs] and [the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver] for coming together and working in partnership. I know that B’nai Brith is new on the scene [in BC] and this is a very important piece, but I also think it’s really important to recognize those that have been working … for a number of years to make this happen.”

The timing of the announcement, in the weeks after the Oct. 7 terror attacks in Israel and in the midst of a massive spike in antisemitism worldwide, was coincidental. The issues, though, are related.

Robinson said the provincial government has been vigilant in monitoring antisemitism and potential for violence in British Columbia. She credited Minister of Public Safety and Solicitor General Mike Farnworth for spearheading the response.

“He called me every single day from Oct. 7 for about 10 days, to report in to me about what was happening on the ground,” she said. In addition to her official role with advanced education, Robinson said she is known among colleagues as “the Jew in the crew,” as the provincial elected official who is most publicly visible in her Jewishness.

On Nov. 1, Robinson convened a meeting of the heads of the 25 post-secondary institutions in the province.

“I got agreement from all 25 presidents that they would do everything within their power to make sure that everyone felt safe on their campuses,” she said. “I don’t think solving that is going to be an easy task, but it’s absolutely a requirement of all of them, because, in this province and in this country, we believe that everybody has the right to be who they are and to feel safe and, if it’s not happening, then we need to fix it.”

A bipartisan love-in that has been going on between Robinson and Lee, who represents Vancouver-Langara (the provincial constituency that includes many of Vancouver’s Jewish institutions and residents), continued Sunday in the obvious respect and affection between the two MLAs despite party lines. Lee made the news last week after rising in the house to give a personal tribute to Robinson’s strength as a leader who is Jewish in this challenging time and Robinson reciprocated kind words at the B’nai Brith event.

“Michael Lee has been a steadfast supporter, not just in this particular situation,” she said. “But also [to me] as a Jewish person who is having her own experience as a Jew around what is happening.”

Robinson spoke emotionally about the impacts of current events on her family, which includes her Israeli soon-to-be son-in-law, who became a permanent resident of Canada at the end of September.

Making Holocaust education a mandatory part of the province’s education curriculum has been a dream of the people at the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre since the organization was founded, in 1994, according to Nina Krieger, the VHEC’s executive director.

“I think stars aligned and David Eby acknowledged Selina Robinson as being a key driving force in this initiative,” Krieger told the Independent.

A process of consultation will now begin and Krieger expects her agency will be central to that work, identifying and providing resources to help craft the new curriculum, which is likely to be a component of the Social Studies 10 learning outcomes.

“Certainly we bring a wealth of experience and a roster of programs and resources and best practices that will be relevant to the curriculum development process,” she said. “We are also poised to work with the minister of education to play whatever role is needed for that process. Also, we know the implementation and resource tools and training that teachers are going to need will be really important as well, so we’re looking forward to supporting the province and the teachers directly with that.”

The Jewish Federation and CIJA will continue to be engaged with the planning for mandatory Holocaust education. Both organizations issued statements after the announcement Oct. 30.

“When left unchecked, antisemitism culminates in some of the darkest chapters in human history. By learning from the Holocaust, we honour the memories of its victims and, we hope, contribute to preventing future tragedies,” said Ezra Shanken, Federation’s chief executive officer. “Today’s announcement shows the BC government’s commitment to creating a safer society for all.”

“Education is key to ensuring that our children learn to combat hate and that the Jewish community can live in a safer province,” said Nico Slobinsky, CIJA’s vice-president for the Pacific Region. “We look forward to working with the BC government on implementing mandatory Holocaust education in our province’s K-12 curriculum.”

At Sunday’s event, Marvin Rotrand, national director of B’nai Brith’s League of Human Rights, speaking virtually from Montreal, noted that 15 US states have some form of mandatory Holocaust education – and early indications from studies in those jurisdictions indicate a decrease in hate crimes not only toward Jews but other groups as well.

Help fund Gary documentary

The costs of completing the documentary A 20th Century Passion include editing time, colour correction and sound mix. (screenshot)

A GoFundMe campaign has been launched to bring to the big screen a documentary about the late Peter Gary, a Hungarian-born composer, Holocaust survivor and resident of Victoria.

The online fundraising effort to complete A 20th Century Passion was started by filmmaker David Malysheff and Gary’s widow, Judith Estrin. Their goal is $35,000.

Gary passed away in 2016, the same year his oratorio A 20th Century Passion premièred in Jerusalem. The work spans the period from the First World War to the Nuremberg trials, including his experiences living in and surviving three years in three different concentration camps.

Gary had a message, the campaign organizers say, which was to stamp out hate. Over the years, he delivered this message to tens of thousands of students throughout Canada.

“The message of the oratorio is to remember history, that hate is ugly and brutal and should be stopped. It is a love piece in honour of Peter’s mother, who was brutally murdered by the Nazis while Peter spent three years in death camps,” Estrin said.

“Like all classical oratorios, it is tragic – this one deals not with the life of Jesus but with the six million murdered Jews. Because Peter had to deal with the murdered bodies of children, he dedicated the piece to the murdered 1.5 million Jewish children,” she said.

While Gary wrote the oratorio over a period of many years, revising it right up to time of his death, it was mostly written during 1970s and 1980s. Barak Tal, the conductor who led the work in Jerusalem, spent time with Gary at his home, going over every note.

The documentary explains how the oratorio came to fruition, using the Jerusalem performance as the score beneath the narrative. The film also shows Gary speaking to high school students about his experiences.

Malysheff, who has been a cinematographer for The Nature of Things, Us and Them and The Fifth Estate, described the film as a passion project – one for which he has not received any payment in the seven years since he began working on it. The costs of completing the film, including editing time, colour correction, sound mix and more, have led Estrin and him to appeal to the public for support.

The importance of A 20th Century Passion at this time cannot be overstated, Estrin said. “With antisemitic hate crimes and acts up just since Oct. 7, the message to stamp out hate, to go in peace, is more critical than ever,” she said. “The world has lost its moral compass, and this piece is about the hope that [people] will remember what horror the 20th century held for the world. We are facing an enemy who wants to annihilate all Jews. Once they are done with us, they will come for everyone else.”

screenshot - The documentary shows Peter Gary, a Holocaust survivor, speaking to high school students about his experiences — The documentary shows Peter Gary, a Holocaust survivor, speaking to high school students about his experiences. *(screenshot)*

The filmmakers also point out that a significant number of North Americans born after 1981 cannot name a single concentration camp or ghetto and think that fewer than six million Jews were killed during the Holocaust. An alarming percentage of young people, they added, hold the opinion that the Jews caused the Holocaust.

Gary was born in 1924 into an artistic family that included famed Hungarian musicians, such as conductor Eugene Ormandy and pianist Lili Kraus. Through his mother’s encouragement, he began his musical training on the piano before the age of 5.

Deemed a musical “wunderkind,” Gary was admitted at the age of 9 to Budapest’s Franz Liszt Academy of Music, where he studied advanced choral and orchestral composition, as well as conducting, under the tutelage of Bela Bartok, Zoltan Kodaly and Leo Weiner.

In 1940, Gary’s education stopped when both he and his mother were arrested by the Nazis. His father was away on a business trip, which allowed him to escape into hiding. Gary spent the next years in concentration camps before he was liberated from Bergen-Belsen by the British on his 21st birthday.

Following the war, Gary moved to Paris to resume his musical studies at Sorbonne University. He received a doctorate in musicology there in 1949.

Gary then immigrated to the United States and, for a brief time, worked in the music department at MGM. In 1963, he took a year off to compose a ballet suite that was performed in France. During his life, he composed more than 20 orchestral pieces, which have been performed in the United States, Canada, Germany, Holland, France and Scotland.

The film runs approximately 90 minutes. Malysheff and Estrin would like it shown at Jewish film festivals and in schools. They have a curriculum for secondary schools that uses the libretto as text. To date, the oratorio has been translated into Hebrew, French and German.

The Jerusalem performance of A 20th Century Passion is available on YouTube. More on Gary can be found at jewishindependent.ca/help-passion-to-israel and jewishindependent.ca/holocaust-survivor-peter-garys-oratorio.

To donate to the documentary’s fundraising campaign, visit gofund.me/d335a5f8. All who send in a contribution will receive a screen credit for being part of the message of the film.

Sam Margolis has written for the Globe and Mail, the National Post, UPI and MSNBC.

The opposite of death is love

Hadar Galron in Whistle, which is at the Firehall Arts Centre Nov. 14-15, as part of the Chutzpah! Festival. (photo by Nathan Yakobovitch)

“As a child I was never hugged or kissed; I think my parents did not even see me. I wrote this story to stop being an invisible child,” Israeli author Ya’akov Buchan has said about Whistle: My Mother was Mengele’s Secretary.

The play Whistle is part of this year’s Chutzpah! Festival, with performances Nov. 14 and 15 at the Firehall Arts Centre. Writer, director and actor Hadar Galron, who adapted Buchan’s story for the stage, stars in the monodrama.

“Buchan was born to two Auschwitz survivors, and began writing after he was injured in the Yom Kippur War. He’s written 18 books – four concerning the Holocaust – but he felt that people don’t read so much anymore, and that he wanted to write a play about second generation Holocaust survivors,” explained Galron in an interview with the Independent. “Dramatic writing and prose are very different techniques, and Ya’akov sent me about 30 pages of interesting and well-written content, but not dramatic enough for stage.

“The first meeting with him was out of respect – I thought I’d give him a few tips and let him take it from there,” she continued. “I remember the turning point: I said, ‘You mention twice in these pages the name Mengele. You can’t just throw in a name like that, it needs to have some dramatic payoff, or not to be mentioned at all.’ Ya’akov said nothing, just nodded. And, suddenly, I thought that maybe Mengele had tortured one of his parents. ‘Were any of your parents somehow … (how to say this?!) … connected to Mengele?’ Ya’akov looked me squarely in the eye and said, quietly, ‘My mother was Mengele’s secretary.’ That was when I knew I would take the task, and help him tell his story and the story of the second generation.”

In recent years, Galron has been working on several plays that deal with the lasting impacts of trauma. “We tend not to consider [the] second generation as traumatic,” she said, “but something as horrendous as the Holocaust leaves some people so scarred that they cannot really love anymore, even their children. Or, they love but in a different, obsessive way. The children who grow up without feeling love are traumatized, too, but their wounds are invisible.

“It’s important to understand that, whilst the trauma lasts a minute or a year or five years, post-trauma lasts a lifetime and, when considering [the] second generation, then even more than a lifetime. Long-term traumas such as [the] Holocaust are not a swing of the sword, they are more like the bite of a snake – the venom penetrates the body and mixes with the blood of the victim.”

Though she generally directs her own works, Galron said, “When I’m the actress, I need someone on the outside. At first, I thought maybe I’d direct and not act. It was Ya’akov who begged me, after seeing my stand-up cabaret Passion Killer, to act the part.”

Jaffa, Israel-born director and playwright Hana Vazana Grunwald was the first person who came to Galron’s mind to direct.

“We studied theatre together at Tel Aviv University, but that was decades ago! I had no idea where to find her,” said Galron. “We’d met a couple of times in festivals, etc., along the years. I was thinking of her on my morning walk-jog in the park by my home. In the distance, I saw a woman that reminded me of Hana and then we got closer and I saw it actually was Hana! She lives five minutes away from me, but that was the first day she decided to go out and take a power-walk before work. I don’t believe in coincidence – it’s only God’s way of remaining anonymous.”

Grunwald started out in community theatre more than 25 years ago. She is the director of the Frechot Ensemble, a collective of women creators, which she founded some 10 years ago.

“I see myself as a feminist Mizrahi (Middle Eastern Jew) writer, who brings to the forefront my personal story,” she told the Independent. “But my personal story is never just my own, it’s an inherent part of my political story, my family’s story and the collective which I belong to. I feel that my world isn’t really represented in Israeli theatre. I don’t see the household I grew up in, I don’t encounter complexities and dilemmas that interest me. I realized I have the responsibility to represent myself – I have to write these texts, I have to tell these stories. My job is to search through history and prose and to bring back the voice of all those whose voice was taken away from them.”

When Galron sent her the script for Whistle, Grunwald said, “I was immediately hooked. But, after we met again, I felt that the opportunity to work together and find connections would also be reflected in the play’s dramaturgy.

“The challenge that the play Shirika [Whistle, in Hebrew] brings to our door is how to retell the story of the Holocaust and the story of the members of the second generation, who feel transparent. Two images guided me in my search for the keys to directing the play,” said Grunwald.

“The first: whistle. Tammy, the protagonist, lost her ability to whistle, she lost her ability to love and feel loved and, as she says in the play, ‘The opposite of death is not life, the opposite of death is love.’ The way this whistle is expressed on stage is through the prop of a kettle full of boiling water. The boiling and bubbling kettle and the whistler on stage metaphorically tell the story of the Holocaust, a story that never ends.

“The second image we chose is the painting. Tammy is a painter and, when we wondered what was painted on the stage, we realized that the body is the canvas, the body treasures and carries the wounds of the past, the memories – the actress jumps from limb to limb and with the help of simple means such as brushes and paints Tammy marks national history…. This is the way in which the trauma is present again on the stage.

“It seems that precisely now the spectacle of a whistle is given a relevant meaning,” Grunwald added. “We find ourselves facing a terrorist attack in which again Israeli Jews are brutally murdered and mass murdered because of their Jewishness. We again witness horror stories in this war against Hamas. We find ourselves again, 75 years after the establishment of the state of Israel, in a shocking event that reminds us of the fear of being destroyed. The harsh scenes from both sides shake the soul, sow terror and fear, and remind us that the feeling of security is a temporary illusion and we must not forget it. I work at the Hebrew-Arab theatre in Jaffa, a theatre that gives a stage to the binational discourse, it gives a stage to both narratives, and I feel that, these days, it is the first to be hurt.”

Galron also works with artists of different backgrounds and shared one of her experiences.

“Between 2016 and 2018, I was artistic director of the Shalom Festival, a small festival that was an official part of the Edinburgh Fringe fest,” she said. “We created this festival after an Israeli production, in 2014, was shouted down by the BDS [boycott, divest and sanction movement] and, in 2015, there were no Israeli productions.”

She was inspired by Sir Rudolf Bing, founding director of the Edinburgh International Festival, from which the Edinburgh Fringe Festival has its roots. Galron explained that Bing, a Jewish-Austrian opera singer, who fled Nazi Germany, “created the festival as a cultural bridge, inviting, firstly, German artists to take part! With that in mind, I told the sponsors of the Shalom Festival that we cannot make a one-sided Shalom (Peace) Festival and that, as the artistic director, I would like to bring artists from all of Israel, including Israeli Arabs – both Muslim and Christian – and also some Palestinian artists. At first, there was big objection but, eventually, I convinced them that these are Palestinians who believe in peace, in dialogue. Until today, even in these times, I am in contact with my Palestinian friends.

“I believe art is a bridge,” she said. “I believe art and culture and theatre have the power to heal – to give us insight and create empathy. From my very first performance as a stand-up artist – my show was on the status of women in the Jewish law – I made a decision to make my art meaningful, to merge life and stage.”

Since the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attacks on Israel, Galron has been posting related videos and other items on Facebook, including “Creativity in place of survival” writing challenges. She got the idea from a course she took during COVID with Dr. Joe Dispenza. “In one of the online digital courses, he speaks of how our brain can be either in ‘survival’ or in ‘creativity’ mode,” said Galron. “The moment I heard this, I understood many things about myself and how creativity has always been for me a way of surviving. Now I know that, when we begin to be creative, we actually begin to pull ourselves out of ‘survival’ [mode] even if we are being creative whilst we try to survive. A bit like Baron Munchausen explains that he pulls himself by his hair out of the pit.”

About how she is doing since the attacks, Galron said, “I didn’t have a real answer to that question until yesterday, because everything is so chaotic. But I was speaking to a university student of mine who answered, ‘I’m committed to the good.’ I was so moved by this. She told me she adopted it from her yoga teacher. I adopted it from her. I’m committed to the good.”

For tickets to Whistle and other Chutzpah! shows, visit chutzpahfestival.com.

Trauma, loss and hope

Composer Rita Ueda has written an opera inspired by Barbara Bluman’s book I Have My Mother’s Eyes. (photo by Danilo Bobyk)

“In light of what is happening in the news today, we need to tell the story of Chiune Sugihara and the Bluman family more than ever,” composer Rita Ueda told the Independent. “I suspect more and more world leaders, communities and individuals will be faced with the decision to either do the easy thing, or the right thing. We need to tell ourselves more stories of compassion, courage, healing and family love.”

Ueda’s chamber opera I Have My Mother’s Eyes: A Holocaust Memoir Across Generations premières at the Rothstein Theatre Nov. 18-19, as part of the Chutzpah! Festival. Directed by Heather Pawsey, the opera tells the story of Sugihara, the Japanese diplomat who risked his own life during the Holocaust to issue visas to Jews, including members of Vancouver’s Bluman family. Its title comes from the late Barbara Bluman’s book of the same name, which was published in 2009, five years after her death from cancer.

“I don’t think I fully knew why I wanted my mother’s book published … when I immersed myself in this legacy project,” said Danielle Schroeder. “Looking back, bringing her story and my grandmother’s stories to life brought me a lot of comfort and meaning as I grappled with the profound sense of loss her death brought…. Also, at the time it was published, stories about the impact of intergenerational trauma and resilience were not being written about that much in the mainstream, so I felt my mom’s book was unique in the way it interweaves and interconnects her and her mother’s stories of trauma, loss and hope. And, of course, being able to share with the world the story of courage, generosity and compassion of the Sugihara family was also important to me.”

Ueda found out about the Bluman family in 2017, through an installation at the Maritime Museum, and reached out to George Bluman, Barbara’s brother. She was moved by the intergenerational nature of I Have My Mother’s Eyes.

“Zosia [Susan] Bluman’s escape from the Holocaust is only a part of the story,” she said. “The story of how the next two generations carried on the family legacy affected me to the core. When George suggested I expand the opera to include the story of the three generations of the Sugihara family that saved them, I became compelled to create the opera!”

“I was very touched and honoured that such a well-respected Canadian composer would want to write an opera about my mom’s book,” said Schroeder. “Especially after meeting Rita in person and learning … how my mom’s book impacted her, it was easy to say ‘yes.’”

Ueda’s opera is inspired by Barbara Bluman’s book, rather than based on it.

“Opera is best suited to convey the characters’ emotional journey,” Ueda explained. “The opera covers all three characters from the book – Zosia, Barbara and Danielle – the three generations of the Bluman women, and their love for each other in light of all the events in their lives. Materials on the three generations of the Sugihara family were based on my two visits to the Sugihara family in Tokyo. Madoka Sugihara spent over five hours with me on each visit, and she showed me many photos and books. She let me play [her grandfather] Chiune Sugihara’s collection of sheet music on his piano, and she told me many family stories. I was truly moved by the two families’ journey of survival, healing, and love for each other.”

George Bluman shared a bit about the real-life people depicted: Zosia, Barbara and Danielle on the Bluman side and Chiune, Yukiko, Hiroki and Madoka on the Sugihara side.

Bluman’s mother was born in 1920 and died in 2004. “Her story, before coming to Vancouver in July 1941, comes to life in I Have My Mother’s Eyes,” he said. “In Vancouver, she worked as a salesperson/buyer in women’s clothing at Cordell’s and Jermaine’s. She was one of the founders of the annual Warsaw Ghetto memorial program, the forerunner of the current annual Yom Hashoah commemoration. Mum is featured in the 2000 PBS documentary Sugihara Conspiracy of Kindness, as well as in the Holocaust museums in Washington, New York and Los Angeles. She loved her family, hosting raucous weekly Sunday dinners for all, often including her children’s friends.

“My sister, Barbara Bluman (1950-2001), graduated from UBC Law School in 1975, among the first large class of women. She was an independent thinker and feminist who lovingly balanced raising her children and her career in law. Her commitment to human rights was demonstrated in all of her pursuits…. Her deep dedication to Holocaust understanding led to her contribution to the Gesher Project, a second-generation cultural exploration of the Holocaust, and organizing an important symposium on the Nuremberg trials.”

Bluman said that, from 1996 to 2000, his sister made notes from 19 interviews with their mother. “Excerpts from these notes formed the basis for her book,” he said, praising his niece’s efforts in getting the book published.

“Yukiko Sugihara (1913-2008) married Chiune Sugihara (1900-1986) in 1936,” said Bluman. “In 1993, my family first met her, together with her oldest son, Hiroki (1936-2002), and Michi (Hiroki’s wife) for a few hours at the Vancouver airport during a stopover on their way to a dinner in Toronto organized by Ontario Premier Bob Rae involving the Jewish and Japanese communities. There was a spontaneous outpouring of strong emotions. To me, in her demeanour, she was an empress! She knew no English and I no Japanese, but I felt what she was saying. My mum and Barbara attended the dinner in Toronto, where the principal guest speaker was David Suzuki.”

There were a few other encounters, and Bluman said he and his brother Bob have corresponded regularly with Madoka. “I have met her twice in visits to Japan,” said Bluman, noting that Bob joined him on the second visit.

“Madoka is a very gracious person and works passionately on making the world aware of the heroic legacy of her grandparents. According to Madoka, her grandmother Yukiko played a most essential role in the Sugihara story.”

Ueda’s opera is “especially meaningful,” said Schroeder, “because it brings my mother back to life and honours her in such a profound way.”

She added, “I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for the Sugihara family, so to see a piece of art be created that brings our family together is moving beyond words.”

photo - Teiya Kasahara as Yukiko Sugihara and Barbara Ebbeson as Zosia Bluman in I Have My Mother’s Eyes, which is part of the Chutzpah! Festival — Teiya Kasahara as Yukiko Sugihara and Barbara Ebbeson as Zosia Bluman in I Have My Mother’s Eyes, which is part of the Chutzpah! Festival. *(photo by Flick Harrison)*

It has taken seven years to get to this point – the opera’s première.

“George and Danielle have been wonderful to work with,” said Ueda. “They have shown me photos (which you will see in the production) and shared family stories with me. They also introduced me to the wonderful Sugihara family.”

Ueda shared “two fun facts”: George Bluman, an emeritus math professor at UBC, trained her brother, a former math professor himself; and she has received permission to turn Yukiko Sugihara’s Midnight Sun Songs, poems that chronicle her story as the wife of Chiune Sugihara, into a sequel to I Have My Mother’s Eyes. The world première will be in Tokyo in October 2024.

Ueda has been composing since she was a toddler. “My late mother was an opera singer, so I grew up in a household with music,” she said. “My early musical ‘scores’ were crayon drawings of picture-representations of the sounds I improvised at the piano. My very first composition teacher when I was 3 (who was about 95 at the time) encouraged me to improvise at the piano and to keep on ‘drawing’ scores in crayon colours, even though his own teachers in the 1880s were Helmholtz and Tchaikovsky. He also arranged for me to see many concerts and events with composers such as Steve Reich, Earle Brown and John Cage.”

The environment, human rights and other societal issues have inspired Ueda’s work. “People in the audience do not need to agree with what I say in my music, but I want them to use the experience as a catalyst for important community dialogue,” she said.

For Ueda, opera is the perfect medium for telling a story with a strong emotional content.

“Opera cannot deliver a blow-by-blow story like a TV drama, film or documentary,” she acknowledged, “but music combined with voice can speak to you at the deepest, most profound level. Through opera, I hope to tell engaging and relevant stories that are important to us – who we are, what we stand for, and what we believe in. European opera has had a history of elitism throughout the past 400 years, but recent Canadian opera productions have been changing this. I hope I Have My Mother’s Eyes will contribute to this change.”

For tickets to see I Have My Mother’s Eyes, visit chutzpahfestival.com.