Hope Is Never Dead- Ashley Hubaykah

View from the Synagogue in the American Jewish Center

Excerpts from a Jewish Prayer Book at the American Jewish Center

It would be cliché to say that there are too many things going through my mind my first day in Poland. But, I am going to go ahead and be cliché and tell you that there is. After a 10 hours plane ride, staying up for just about 24 hours and touring Oświęcim, I can barely write what my thinking and let alone keep my eyes open.

Before we left for Poland, we had a class with Dr. Alan Rosen, one of Dr. Procario-Foley’s teachers from Israel this summer. After his lecture, he asked us to email him with our thoughts. My thoughts consisted of me wondering how hope was even possible to believe when I thought about the Holocaust. Dr. Alan Rosen responded back to me with,

“Elie Wiesel writes that in Auschwitz the pious Jews said, "Auschwitz will not win over us. We are stronger than Auschwitz; and if they were, shouldn't we be, too?”

I struggled with understanding his response because it is almost impossible for me to comprehend how to be strong or even believe there is hope. When we arrived in Oświęcim, I was not feeling too hopeful at all. It was cloudy, rainy, and dreary. The mood was fitting my thoughts and hope was nowhere in sight for me.

But, as we were driving from the airport, I was captured by the endless landscape. The mountains were vibrant green and reminded me that the world is inherently good. The mountains reminded me that even though being hopeful may be difficult, I should try in honor for the people at Auschwitz.

We were immediately welcomed with open arms at the Center for Dialogue and Prayer. Sister Mary was there to greet us and let me just say she is the cutest thing in the world!

We did not have much time to settle in as we headed to the American Jewish Center. The museum was particularly interesting for me because the museum in Oświęcim is partnered with where I intern The Museum of Jewish Heritage-A Living Memorial to the Holocaust. The museum restored the house of Szymon Kluger, the last Jewish man from Oświęcim to survive Auschwitz.

Later that afternoon, Sister Mary took us on a walking tour of the town. It was here that I was first confronted with life and death in one day. At the end of the day, we visited a Jewish cemetery that was destroyed in 1939 when the Germans invaded Poland. It was here that I saw the grave of Szymon Kluger. At first, the graveyard seemed something I did not even want to approach, but when I saw Kluger’s grave I remember the reason of why I was even chose to come to Poland.

The moment of when life and death met reminded me of Alan Rosen and how I am called to have hope for the victims and survivors. This hope will be necessary as I come face to face with Auschwitz on Monday. The meeting of life and death today was like the endless landscape. While the pain of the Holocaust seems endless like the landscape, the victim’s lives are vibrant and fill our minds through reflection with wondrous hope, wonder, and awe.