It is hard to find the right way to begin writing about a trip to study the holocaust. Originally, I came from a school and neighborhood with few if any people who were Jewish. Because of this, I felt everything I learned about the holocaust was almost foreign to me. While in grade school learning about the holocaust I got the feeling that I was being taught about an event that had no real connection to any of my grade school classmates. My history teacher would often describe the holocaust using phrases like “those Jews”, “those Nazis”, “those camps”. I felt then as I do now that the holocaust should have a deeper meaning than simply an event that involved “those” people and places. When presented with an opportunity to go on a trip to visit the places that I had only read about in books I jumped at it. I do not think it is possible to truly grasp the significance of the holocaust if one does not visit the camps and other historic sites first hand. There is only so much words in text books can teach you about the holocaust, the human element of the event you can only grasp when you are walking through the camps where millions of people met their end. Only then, I believe, can someone understand how horrific the holocaust truly was and not pass it off as just another event in another history book.
-Nick Bocanegra

For starters: I'm not Jewish nor do I have any close Jewish friends; my family is 100% Mexican and probably had not come in contact with another culture until they arrived here, in the United States, probably less than 20 years ago. In fact, I had never stepped into a conversation where the other person didn't have my skin color, my culture, nor my familiarities until i stepped into the doors of Walter Payton High School. Some can find it hard to believe, but for me it was normal. In my opinion, this is where the beauty of my high school comes in. The blending of cultures, faces, skin colors, and personalities all come together. It's in this building where all our traits and ideas that would otherwise be called different, conviniently blend to make one culture; a culture creatively crafted to be our own "Payton" culture. Within all of this, we come out with stories of our own such as that of the Holocaust which are important to each of us in different ways.
I know you've probably visited this site to get some answers. Probably to find out why a group of 18 students want to embark on a great journey with two amazing teachers, or to possibly find out what ties we may have with the Holocaust, but most importantly, to realize why this trip is important to us. For me, this trip is important because of culture and history. What the Jewish population underwent during World War I was a tragedy and one that should never be forgotten. But in my opinion it's not only about the Jewish culture and history, it's about that of humanity as a whole. The culture I talked about earlier (as the "Payton" culture) is the one I'm more or less trying to get at. It's not an individual one but a mutual one shared by everyone. In the end, we all have the same feelings of embarrasment, sadness, happiness, and anger. We strive for "better lives" so that our kids and their kids can have a good as a life as we did if not better. This is just the same for those millions of people that lost their lives in the Holocaust. Their stories, hopes, dreams, pains and joys should also be remembered.
There are many reasons why i want to go on this trip. For one, I want to appreciate and acknowledge a part of history important to many of my collegues in a specific manner through their own Jewish culture. I also want to use this trip as a rememberance of what humanity went through at one point in time. I want to remember that they're not just a war in a history book but that they were people with amazing stories of their own. Lastly, I want to take away from this trip something of my own,something unexpected that i will only find while on the trip.

Sincerely,
Violet

Preparing

I sit here at my computer thinking, where could I possibly start. We are in the middle of a journey, that I don’t think any of us will forget. We sit in class and learn about one of the most unforgettable things in our world’s history and try and grasp what happened. The hardest part about spending hours on end trying to understand how this could happen, and trying to understand the man behind it all, is knowing that I will never be able to fully grasp it. No matter how long someone has studied the dynamics of the Holocaust, no one can feel, or comprehend fully what life was like, because with out the shared feelings of those people, you can’t possibly understand fully. It’s one thing to spend a whole year going through every event and every detail of the Holocaust and another actually going to these places we have read about. I was asked by a fellow student’s parent “How are you going to prepare yourself for something like this?”, the question took me by surprise at first, but now that I have thought about it, I can’t prepare myself. None of us can possibly prepare themselves to walk into something of this intensity. Knowing how hard it is to read, and visit museums about these events I can’t possibly imagine how, not only I, but all of us, will react and feel.

-Jasmine Hooks

Just Some Thoughts

The Holocaust is one of those events that everyone can relate to, whether you had a family member die in the Holocaust, you partake in anti-genocidal rallies and clubs, or you just think that such horrific acts such as this one should never happen again. Never again. That phrase can mean many things. Never again shall Jews be mass-murdered. Never again shall one man influence a whole society with his words. Never again shall another genocide occur. But they already have. Rwanda, Darfur, Armenia, and so many others are part of the elite club called "Genocides of the Past Century." So what does never again mean? Everyone interprets the Holocaust differently, some to the extent that it never even happened. But no one can dismiss the lessons we can learn and have learned from the event.
It is important to learn about the Holocaust because of these lessons available to society. That is why I am going on this trip. Regardless of my family members who were brutally murdered, regardless of my grandfather who escaped Czechoslovakia 6 days before Hitler invaded, regardless of the fact that I am a Jew. I am going on this trip to get the experience of touching the grounds where my people were killed, an experience that means something different to everyone, and therefore it is the job of everyone to learn about the Holocaust. No one can tell you how to feel about the Holocaust, it is solely up to you. It is your job to feel what you will feel, and learn what you will learn. I've always thought that I hold onto knowledge best when I can relate it to my own life, and my theory proves true in learning about the Holocaust. I forget historical facts about China because as much as that knowledge is valuable, I can't relate it to my life like I can with the Holocaust. For some reason, the Holocaust just sticks. I don't know why, and no one can explain why to me, but I like to think it sticks because of the phrase never again, and because of the photographs of victims whose faces stare blankly at me, no emotion, no life. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are principles that this country stands for. So why did the German's feel that the Jews did not deserve life? Why do we feel that it is wrong to cut down trees and deprive them of their lives? I don't know, no one does, and that is what is so sickening. That approximately 11 million people can die and no one has the complete answer, why them? Why anyone or anything? Why is there this need to be better and stronger and more "macho" than someone? Even for dogs, who is best in show? This human desire to be better rules all, and in terms of the Holocaust, it killed all.

Never again, what does it mean to you?


-Dale G.