Trip to Poland

Reflections from Poland – 100 Cantors from North America Travel to the Former Heartland of European Jewry

I had been to Poland before so I arrived prepared for the beautiful, lush countryside and green parkland.  It wasn’t the grey, bleak country I had come to expect from all the Holocaust movies I had seen.  However, this visit to Poland was different.  There seemed to be a renewal of Jewish life and a keen interest to memorialize the past.  Throughout the streets of Warsaw, there were plaques commemorating what once stood.  On a few older apartment buildings, large photos of former Jewish residents taken to their death by the Nazis, hung outside the windows.  I felt a tingling in my spine as I walked into the Great Nosyk Synagogue in Warsaw for Maariv – a shul where legendary Hazzanim and choirs had inspired countless Jewish people who came to pray.  I was surprised to see men in black kappotes and youth with tzitzit coming to daven.  Who were they?  Surely they had not maintained their Jewish roots through forty-five years of communism.  Poland’s chief Rabbi, an American, explained:  “The Poles are finding their roots.  They are finally emerging once again as an autonomous nation after many years of occupation.”  Those who find a Jewish link in their ancestry are yearning for knowledge and beginning to practice as Jews.  They no longer fear the Nazis or the communists. 

During our visit to the National Jewish Theatre of Warsaw, we met with director Golda Tencer.  A child of Aushwitz survivors, she was born in Lodz and still lives in Poland.  To hear Yiddish spoken on the stage in Warsaw was something I could have only dreamt of.  As the founder of the American-Polish-Israeli Shalom foundation, Golda has given the Jewish Theatre a new lease on life.  “Memory can be saved o¬nly when the past is not passively pondered, but when all that grows out of it is brought into the light.”   Among the foundation’s various initiatives are Yiddish language courses taught in Lodz and Warsaw, the annual Yiddish festival in Warsaw, seminars in Poland’s Universities, and continued support of the Yiddish Theatre which still operates a full season of Yiddish plays including the classic works by Abraham Goldfaden, Mendele Mocher Sforim, Sholem Aleichem and Izchak Leib Peretz.  For further details on the foundation’s various initiatives, visit their website at www.shalom.org.pl.

I have been a “kippah wearing” Jew for over fifteen years.  I wasn’t certain what the correct protocol in Poland would be.  During my first moments in Krakow, I saw a fist fight break out on the street.  I put my kippah in my pocket and crossed the street.  I later decided to put it back on and a cyclist passed me and shouted “Shalom”.  A tear trickled down my face.  Was it fair to blame an entire nation -- a new generation, for the sins of the past?  I wore my kippah proudly for the remainder of my stay. 

The cantors hosted a gala concert at the Warsaw Opera House with the Warsaw Symphony Orchestra.  Who would attend such an event – a cantorial concert in Warsaw?  There was not an empty seat in the 2000+ seat concert hall!  Polish people bought tickets to come and hear cantors sing.  Government officials, including Poland’s first lady were in attendance.  Was I dreaming?  The concert began with a group of Polish children dressed in cute red uniforms enthusiastically singing the Polish national anthem.  I was not emotionally prepared for what happened next – the children sang Hatikvah followed by Ani Maamin, a song which Jewish men, women and children sang 65 years ago as they marched to their death.  Those little voices singing our music in our language – I could not suppress the tears.  Did the Polish people really want us back? 

Intrigued by Poland’s one thousand year Jewish history, I began reading the statistics provided to us by the Taube Foundation for Jewish Life and Culture.  Their logo reads as follows…“Poland’s Jewish heritage belongs to all of us.  We invite you to join us as we reclaim it.”  In prewar Poland there were 3.5 million Jews, 4 million in the United States and 175,000 in British Mandated Palestine.  The most powerful message of my trip was acknowledging that the modern state of Israel was largely built and populated by Holocaust survivors.  That was brought to life when we visited Aushwitz / Birkenau.  As we stood between the barracks davening shacharit, we saw a group of Israeli soldiers in uniform pass.  The davening stopped, replaced by thunderous applause for the brave men and women who defend our Jewish homeland.  Later when we arrived at Birkenau, we lined up along the infamous railway tracks and saluted the soldiers as they passed between us carrying a sefer Torah.  Imagine the scene…the Israeli soldiers in uniform, marching on the soil where the Nazis brutalized our people…what a moment of Jewish pride.  We are here!
Today, Krakow hosts the largest Jewish music and culture festival in the world.  It is held in the old Jewish neighbourhood of Kazimierz.  The area is filled with remnants of its Jewish past including numerous synagogues, cemeteries, Jewish museums, “Jewish” restaurants (although they are only Jewish in name).  Jewish culture appears to be trendy.  The closing klezmer concert must have attracted 5000-7000 people packed like sardines into an open square with Poles of all ages dancing and drinking in the streets.  Is this their version of Woodstock?  I discovered that the founder of this festival, now in its 19th year, is not even Jewish.  I sat at one of the bars for a drink to escape the revelry.  It was dimly lit, and only later did I notice that the tables were old Singer sewing machines, black hats from another era were hanging on the hat rack and old family photos were still on the walls.  This former tailor shop was now a bar with all the memorabilia still intact.  It did not feel right.  
After spending one week in Poland, I returned home confused.  I have more questions than answers.  Jewish people made up an integral part of Polish society for 1000 years.  Today, government officials are committed to memorializing Poland’s rich Jewish history.  American and Israeli institutions and foundations are spearheading the initiative but there is little doubt that “Jewish is in.”  There is a revival amongst Jews looking for their roots and a renaissance amongst Polish people wanting to bring back something lost during the darkest chapter in human history.