December 2006 Third day

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David here. Rabbi Hachen will be back tomorrow. Today was another incredible day with sunshine all day long. We were on the run from the very start. We heard speakers about the success and struggles of Reform Judaism and I was very proud as Rachel received a mounted certificate acknowledging the Butterflies she collected from our Religious school. There is a program here where they are trying to collect 1.5 million drawn paper butterflies, decorated by children to remember that same amount of children who perished in the Holocaust. While this is not a pleasant subject it is gratifying to see my daughter begin to learn the importance of not forgetting this horrible time.

From there we went to the old city and before going to the Jewish quarter we saw the place that is recognized as where King David is buried. A moving moment to see how serious other visitors prayed at the sight.

We went into the Jewish Quarter looked at more archaeological ruins but to Nina and Rachel's delight, did some shopping. Believe it or not Rachel wanted a Tallis and we bought it for her along with a ......Shofar. She got a sound on her second try!

We had a nice lunch overlooking the city with an incredible view of the Mosque landmarks and then it was on to the Western Wall. Another moving moment to understand the magnitude of how old it is and to know it is what is left of the Second Temple. As we toured more of the area we saw (and heard) just how close Jews pray to the Moslem world as on the other side we heard the sounds calling Moslems to afternoon prayers.

After looking at more interesting remains of the wall and Temple we went to Yad Vashem. I saw it as a better museum than the one in Washington DC, mainly because it was bigger and had even more detail. But for me, the impact was when Ziv, our guide, talked about how almost every citizen of Israel has a connection to the Holocaust and then seeing about 200 Israeli soldiers touring the museum as it is required for them to understand the relevance to protecting the State of Israel. As a matter of fact, we learned that all of those soldiers, male and female, were training to be officers.

Don't worry, our guide took care of Rachel and another young girl from our group so they did not go into the Museum. They did tour the outside monuments. Yad Vashem has a special, solemn room kind of like a Yhartzeit room where Kaddish can be said for those that perished. It is a huge sunken floor with a flame in the middle and all of the names of the Death Camps are engraved in Hebrew and English. Rachel came in with us (she hears Kaddish at Friday night services so she knows the importance of that prayer). We stood in front of where Terezenstad (I apologize for mispelling) was enrgaved. The butterfly collecting that I referred to earlier is inspired by a poem written about butterflies and how they don't come to Terezenstad. Its late and I am sorry but I don't remember the Poet's name but he was just 14 years old. I pointed to the name and told Rachel that was where the boy wrote the poem. She made the important connection but then wanted to know where all of the bodies were buried. This I would not answer and just told her we don't know. In a way, Rachel's day came full circle.

I am not ending on that note. We are enjoying the trip immensely. Our group is terrific and we are eating great food....fallafel, eggplants, all kinds of Middle Eastern stuff. And I am exhausted, tomorrow it is off to Masada and the Dead Sea.

Quick note from Debby --
Thanks David for doing the blog last night! Wanted to add that I meet up with Miriam from Sderot, the "Chesed" (good deeds/mercy) lady who runs a center of sorts for mothers, children, etc. including "free" (1 shekel) meals, a clothing "store" (almost free, again), and a food pantry for needy people. And she also educates women to help run the place, and I think also to learn more about childrearing. I saw photos of the children's holiday parties. What a lady! She was originally a nursery school teacher; had an accident and spent 2 years in a wheelchair, and then decided this tzedaka work was what she was called to do. She's been in Sderot for 14 years. One of her children, her daughter age 16, came up to meet me too. We had dinner and then I gave her the clothes we had brought for the children. She tells me that the pantry shelves are empty again (our temple member Tami helped fill them with baby formula for a while, and another large donation raised by Tami will be there soon.) If you are reading this and want to help Miriam, contact me at my email address after January 1.

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