Israel 12/13/2018: Yad Vashem

We didn’t get to sleep until 1:30 or so last night, and got up maybe 7:30, which wasn’t enough sleep for me.  After an ample breakfast, including poached salmon, we set off for Yad Vashem, which is over in West Jerusalem.  It’s pretty overwhelming — we were there from maybe 10:30 - 2.  

You zig-zag back and forth, from one side of a prism to the other, in more or less chronological order.  There are many videos of survivors, telling their stories.  One woman was among those to be shot, falling into a pit of dead bodies — but she lived; she was 7.  Another boy dropped through the floor of the cattle car carrying him to the camps.  Another boy, in a ghetto; in the daytime, they prayed to live to see the stars at night; at night; they prayed to see the sunrise.  (Which is reminiscent of a passage out of the Torah of being cursed — in the daytime, you will long for evening, in the evening, you will long for morning).  Boys in a camp, reciting passages from the Haggadah about being free from slavery.  A boy who came home to his house, and his family was all shot dead — their bodies naked and swollen.

All interspersed with maps and figures and data sheets from Hitler’s minions.  And, of course, when Hitler was defeated, it’s not like there was someplace for the survivors to return to; the massacres in Poland of survivors after the war.  And the hidden children, who didn’t see much good about being Jewish.

It was all pretty harrowing.  I got separated from Rose maybe midway through the exhibit.  When you’re done w/ the exhibit, you emerge into a courtyard, then there’s a courtyard, where I just sat for a while, not sure if Rose was ahead of me or behind.  There was a bookstore, but I didn’t feel like buying anything.  Then there was a “Hall of Remembrance”.    Finally I walked back to the entrance-building, and found Rose.  We’d run through our shekels by then, but she dug up enough for me to buy a sandwich, and then we waited for the shuttle bus to take us to the light rail to take us into the Old City, where she had errands to run — to a gift store that sold crafts by the elderly, and to a scribal store, to buy a mezuzah scroll for a friend.  Also, we needed an ATM.  I was pretty tired and footsore by then (it was maybe 4:30), and got some money at a store’s ATM (but I think it gave me 240, not 400 shekels), and took a taxi  back to the hotel, where I lay down, had a cup of tea, listened to NPR news.  Rose headed for the market and more adventures.