What We Carry Forward: From Poland to Passover

There were two ways to go. One path looked clearer, less muddy, and more manageable. Of course, I chose that one. And yet, after a while, it didn’t seem to matter. There was mud everywhere, and eventually, I succumbed to it. Perhaps that is the nature of some journeys; there is no clean way through.

I looked down for just a moment, and when I looked back up, I had lost my group. I spotted people ahead and hurried to catch up, following them as they passed through the gate. And then I realized they weren’t mine. I panicked.

Here I was, an adult, fully equipped with every modern convenience, a phone, a watch, the ability to reach someone at any moment. And still, I was afraid.

I was in Auschwitz.

If I, with all my tools and autonomy, could feel that moment of fear, how can one even begin to imagine the experience of a child, alone, possibly unable to speak the language, stripped of anything and anyone that represented any sense of safety or stability? We were confronted with it everywhere, in the stories we heard, the testimonies, the documentation, the shoes, the hair…the hair…

At the Krakow JCC, we were granted the immense privilege of meeting Bernard. He is nearly 97 years old and a survivor who, just four years ago, chose to return to the place where his story began. A story that carried him through five concentration camps. Through deprivation so absolute it defies comprehension. And yet, if you met him, you might think he had just stepped out of Haight-Ashbury in the 1960s. His hippie-vibe positivity. His generosity of spirit. His lightness. It challenges you. It reframes you. It makes you question every complaint, every negative thought you’ve ever held. Bernard spoke with a twinkle in his eye about being single and still very much on the market, living life on his own terms, and working on two films… and perhaps, for those who embrace life so fully, time itself always is. His is a life rebuilt not only in spite of the past, but defiantly, vibrantly, beyond it.

Walking through Kraków, I found myself tracing the remnants of a once-thriving Jewish world. I wondered if Bernard walked these streets as a boy. The Ghetto walls, shaped deliberately like tombstones. A faded Yiddish sign for a kosher butcher, the building innards now replaced by a trendy café. I see stickers about the current war – claims of a genocide in Gaza. Commands to “Free Palestine.”

The past and present exist here in uneasy dialogue. And I couldn’t help but feel the dissonance, standing in a place that witnessed the worst atrocities known to humanity, where Jews were denied even the right to exist, and seeing that even now, in different forms, that question is still being contested.

At Majdanek, where a darkness beyond comprehension once prevailed, our educator gently reminded us: Do not judge. A quiet directive, echoing loudly in a place where judgment once determined life or death. We were left to grapple with impossible questions. What were the survival mechanisms? What ethical lines were drawn or erased? Do I share this piece of bread? Do I choose myself or another? This was the moral landscape of that world. And then, in that very place, a moment unfolded that felt simultaneously small and enormous.

A young Jewish man, trailing behind our group, was alone rolling a large blue suitcase in his hand. We invited him to join us; then came the questions. Do we bring him on the bus? What about liability? What if something happens? All reasonable inquiries. All responsible questions.

And yet how unsettling, to be having this conversation here, of all places. A place where moral decisions once carried unimaginable consequences.

There he stood. A young man, really, just a boy on the cusp of adulthood. Kippah on his head. Face soft, almost cherubic. Quietly rolling his suitcase. One member of our group instinctively stepped forward, helping him navigate the barracks, guarding his belongings. Had this been an Arthur Miller play, the suitcase itself would have been a character; a silent symbol of continuity, of resilience.

Because we know this image.

Jews once arrived here with suitcases. Packed with belongings. With memories. With fragments of lives they believed would continue. We know how that story ended. And in that same place, a different image now stood before us. This young man stood upright. Present. Alive. His Israeli-blue suitcase beside him. He walked into Majdanek to bear witness, and walked out changed, but free. A Jew. Still carrying his suitcase. Still carrying his future.

And in that contrast lies everything.

This journey was part of the StandWithUs Poland Mission, which began just days after the StandWithUs International Conference and ended on the cusp of the eve of Passover.

As Passover approaches, we prepare to tell the story of leaving Mitzrayim as not only a place, but a state of constriction. A place of fear. Of narrowness.

The mission’s timing came with its own constraints. There were those in the group that faced logistical challenges, academic responsibilities, preparations for the holiday. Should we stay within what was manageable, or step into something heavier, more uncertain?

And like the Israelites stepping into the unknown, we did not fully know what we would carry out with us. This we know for sure; this was a choice we will never regret. This was a choice that changed us. Perhaps that is what it means, in our time, to continue the journey out of Mitzrayim; not only to remember the past, but to carry it forward, with courage, with language, and with life.

As I pack to leave, brushing the dried, crusted mud from my shoes, I am reminded that there was never a clean path through this journey. Some things are not meant to be washed away. Some things are meant to be carried forward – still walking in our own time, out of Mitzrayim.