Kitat Maayan כיתת מעיין

During our Masa in Poland we stopped in Krakow to discuss the Jewish life and community that existed in Krakow before the Shoah and how it is now.  We also learned about the ghetto and things such as what the living conditions were like, resistance, eberlaben, and specific stories of individuals that we know of today.  After that we went to Shindler's factory and discussed people who are Righteous of the Nations.  The Old Square is where we ended the day with free time and got a feel for Polish culture.   Everyday in Poland started out with stories of life.  We remember and identify those who lived in the various and diverse communities in Poland.  For our first day in Krakow we celebrated life by visiting the Ramu cemetery and shul hopping.  In the cemetery we learned of stories about individuals who made impacts on their communities.   One of my favorite stories was Mister Next World.  This is the story of a man who would be asked for ...

On Wednesday , Kitat Maayan visited several places to learn about the War of Independence and how Israel became Medinat Yisrael, the State of Israel.  On November 29th, 1947 the UN voted for the partition of Palestine which Jews happily accepted but Arabs denied. The next day, the Palestinian Arabs attacked us and the War of Independence, or in Arabic, Al Nakba, "the catastrophe" began. The War had two stages. During the first stage, we were only defending ourselves from our enemies and in the second stage, we became offensive and created Operation Nachshon that reminded us to stop just defending but to start taking action and defeating. When the State of Israel was established, we had a more connected and united nation. We got the privilege to see and sit in the same room in which Ben Gurion declared independence of the new State of Israel.  We listened to a recording of the meeting, and most importantly, we sang Hatikvah and that was when I got goosebumps. ...

Today we woke up early for our trip to Auschwitz. We ate breakfast at our hotel in Krakow and hopped on the bus for an hour long drive. We started off at Auschwitz birkenau, which was known as the death camp. The death camp’s sole purpose was to annihilate the Jews of Europe. Those who were chosen for life were taken hostage until their death. When we arrived the first sight in plain view was the famous long building with an arch in the middle separating both sides of the building. This is the first thing that shoah victims would also see. The building has railroad tracks on both sides, where prisoners would arrive on cattle cars. These cars were meant for exporting cows to farms, but the Nazis used them to store Jews for rides from 3 hours to 3 weeks. Up to 100 (or maybe more) would be stuffed inside of the cars, sources state that it was hot inside of them and very claustrophobic. After learning about the cattle cars and the selection process we walked over to the destroyed gas c...

Tykocin was the second and my favorite day in Poland. We started the day by going on a two hour bus ride to get there. Tykocin was a very close knit community. Everyone who was from there would introduce themselves by saying "Hi I'm _____ from Tykocin" because they were so proud of where they came from. Once there we were there we went to a synagogue, then to the former market, to the river, did a tfilah in the synagogue, then took a silent bus ride to the Lupochova forest. The synagogue was the first place we went once we arrived. It was a beautiful place with prayers decorating the walls because at the time it was very expensive to print all of the books to pray with. The synagogue was used to pray and study torah and also to read letters from people who had made Aliyah. There we also talked about different people in the community including Levi Tallismacher. He made the best tallitot out of anyone. Everyone wanted an original from him. They had parts of the prayers ...

On November 14th, 2017, Kitat Maayan went to the first concentration camp of our Poland Masa. It was meaningful beyond compare, and helped everyone grasp the holocaust in a new way. We started off the day in Lublin to see what the jewish quarter was pre-war. The jewish quarter and the rest of Lublin was separated by the Grodzka Gate, also known as the Jewish Gate. Jews of the time lived outside the gate, right across from the Lublin castle, and they generally lived in nicer houses than those on the other side of the gate. A View of The Old Jewish Quarter A View of the other side of the gate We then went to a museum which is actually located inside of the gate, right where the Jewish world and the Polish world meet. The museum, which is also a theatre, is dedicated to the jewish population of Lublin which was lost in the Holocaust, and educates people about the vibrant community that once was. It is called the No Name Museum, which I think fits a great deal with their goal....

     Two days before our pilgrimage to Poland, Kitat Maayan adjourned to Yad Vashem, Israel’s museum dedicated to commemorating and researching the Shoah. This was a great pre-requisite to visiting the concentration camps because the museum definitely touched a lot on them. When we first arrived, preceding our tour we visited and learned about the garden dedicated to the rights among the nations. There were many non-Jews witnessing the holocaust from the outside and saw how inhumane it was. Many non-Jews helped the Jews, some by obtaining false ID’s while others helped smuggling out Jews and possibly hide them. Some people gave Jews medical treatment or food. Anyone found giving water to a Jew they and there family was shot to death. So there was a big risk for these non-Jews but one some took. To be given the righteous among the nations award: you had to be a Non-Jew who took no payment and put their own life at risk. 26,000 got this award and either had a tree pla...

After a long night of airport security and a plane ride, we arrived at Chopin International Airport in Warsaw at around 6 a.m. Stepping out of the plane I was hit with the sudden chill of 40 ℉ with overcast. Getting off the plane at Warsaw After getting through customs and retrieving our bags, we met our pilot, Chris, and our bus driver out side the airport. We left for the Cmetarz Żydowski, a historical Jewish Cemetery in the middle of Warsaw . The Cmetarz  Żydowski in Warsaw There, we learned about all kinds of Jews living in Warsaw in their own time periods. For example we learned about L. L. Zamenhof who was a linguist living in Poland who created the hoped-to-be universal language, Esperanto. He had a daughter who was buried adjacent to him. Dr. Zamenhof's grave with the symbol of his creation under it. We then explored other people's graves such as the "Mameh" of Warsaw. She was a famous theater director who performed with her ...

The steps up to the Synagogue in Beit Warshawa When we were in Poland, we had the opportunity to celebrate Shabbat with the local Reform synagogue in Warsaw called Beit Warshawa. When we were seated, we were greeted by the Rabbi and president of the synagogue, along with the rest of the congregants. At the beginning of the service, Ariella was invited up to light the Shabbat candles, and we were introduced to the community in both Polish and English. When the service was starting, I got nervous because maybe I wouldn't know any of the tunes. However, I soon realized that I knew the majority of the tunes from my Havurah (synagogue) at home. We were alsp told that there were 9 new congregants who had just been at the Beit Din earlier that week in order to convert to Judaism. This was an amazing surprise and opportunity to be able to help welcome these 9 Jews into the Jewish community and to watch them join a really special kehillah. Each of them recited the Sh'ma while h...

The first stop we made was at the first moshavot, or settlements made during the first Aliyah's. We sat near some smelly chickens and took notes then Yonatan made us tea and coffee. The Halutzim or the first people to go to Israel were living in Yishuv Yashen, (Religious people living in the holy cities) This Aliyah was called Aliyah Rishona and lasted from 1881 to 1903. About 60,000 Jews came to Israel at this time. Most people came to escape pogroms in Europe. Despite leaving problems behind, these young hopeful families had some problems in Israel too. For example they were in Ottoman territory, Arab people were already living in the land, it was very expensive to purchase. By law he land and dry the swamps, and Malaria was big in the swamps. An on top of everything, once they faced all those problems, they had to farm which was something the Jews didn't know how to do. This was also the beginning of the revival of the Hebrew language. While sitting on the bench's taki...