gitt COUltfy Took Cookoig one.

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HOLOCAUST

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2/13
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38

-1

"We couldn't even speak out loud
for fear that somebody would hear us
... During the day, naturally, we
wouldn't even whisper. At night we
were afraid that somebody might
stand against the wall and listen. We
learned to use a pail for a toilet ... I
wanted to cry ... but I knew I should-
n't cry ... and during the day we
would sit and groom ourselves as
monkeys do in the zoo. All day long
we would clean each other's lice off.
Especially the hair. Once they get in
it's very difficult to get them out."
Notice how it is natural to her that
she did not speak during the day.
Clearly this is a lesson learned early.
They "learned" to use a new toilet (a
pail) and "knew" about not crying.
Her education included animal behav-
ior, the grooming like monkeys; she
offers a brief lesson in the behavior
and effect of lice.
Each survivor described precisely,
with specific purpose and without
ambiguity, an education that was tech-
nical with a vengeance: no talking or
you might be discovered and killed;
no looking in the eye or you might be
selected and killed; no compassion or
concern for others or you might be
tortured and killed.
Each isolated anecdote offers a dif-
ferent facet of this alien educational
phenomenon. I think that despite the
singular, denotative or anecdotal
nature of the testimonies, no other
source of material on the Holocaust
communicates such an educational
ensemble. Such childhood educational
experiences have a specific context and
the lessons endure forever. For all their
disjointedness, they each embody an
education in degradation and unimag-
inable loss and sorrow.
Historians or critics, social scientists
or humanists make decisions on what
to include and exclude from the mate-
rial they uncover in their research.
They interpret.
In a similar fashion, survivors, too,
interpret, deciding, sometimes in split
seconds, what they will and won't
reveal and how they will disclose the
information to us.
Contemporary pragmatic education
does not include silence and terror.
My children did not have to worry
about the practical lessons of mass
murder or the terror of hiding in mis-
ery. But where else but in the testi-
monies will scholars and students
learn about the specific nature of what
children were taught or taught them-
selves during the Holocaust?
If we cannot hope to "understand"

the horrors that befell Jewish children
and adults during the Holocaust, we
can know about them. Those events
need a context, must be related to
methods of perpetuation; and we
ought to learn about bureaucratic and
administrative indifference, European
racism and anti-Jewish violence.
No other historical event can teach
us so well about these products of our
civilization. But I think we can know
of the sort of education I have
descried here — unpleasant and
painful — only through oral histories,
one on one, one at a time, hyper-
attentively listening and trying to hear
what is not said as well as what is spo-
ken. ❑

NOTEBOOK

HARVEST

from page 35

contributions and fund-raisers. Nearly
90 percent Of the revenue helps feed
the hungry.
A secular agency in terms of whom
it serves, Forgotten Harvest boasts
strong Jewish support among board
members and in the business commu--
nity. Jewish Detroiters first teamed up
to fight hunger in 1899. That's when
the then-newly founded United Jew-
ish Charities, forerunner to the Jewish
Federation of Metropolitan Detroit,
inspired wealthier, established Ger-
man Jews (Yahudim) to practice
tzedakah (charity) and feed poorer,
immigrant Eastern European Jews
(Os tj uden). In the early years of this
century, charity reinforced ties among
Detroit's Jews, no matter what their
social standing or how observant they
were. That charitable flame, lit in the
Detroit shtetl around Hastings Street,
eventually spread to where Jews were
helping needy neighbors of all faiths
become independent — the ultimate
intent of tzedakah.
To make a donation of food or
funding to Forgotten Harvest, please
call (248) 350-FOOD. As West
Bloomfield's Marcia Fishman, the
immediate past president and Nancy
Fishman's sister, likes to say: - "Your
compassion will help the hungry feast
on your kindness." ❑

To leave a voice mail message
for Robert Sklar, please dial
(248) 354-6060, ext. 258.

