In recent days, a small and strange group of Israelis has been roaming around Poland. Urbanites and kibbutzniks, secular and religious, from the center or the Gaza Strip. It is not clear what connects them except the pair of words - Zdonska Wola. This is a city or town in central Poland from which their parents came or were expelled.
Listen to Yair Ettinger's full story online at:
For us as a family, on the level of equal involvement, we got off relatively cheap. My grandparents didn't move from camps. They lived in Tel Aviv, ultra-Orthodox, Zionists, young people, only their families were there. Only over the years did we learn what that meant. Also thanks to the writing of my mother, who is such a mute second generation, who collects all the memories of two generations that were erased and also writes poems and books, even these days, but mostly she conveyed to us this feeling that we need to know where we came from. To commemorate and name our children.
So all our lives we hear about this town from which my grandparents left in 1935. Words that mean nothing to Israeli Sabra children. And they always say: 'Yes, of course one day we will go.' But now an opportunity really arose, and we decided to go, all siblings, with our mother. We found a lot of things, more than we imagined. We found family names engraved on stones, we found a grave, we found records at a shipping station.
[gallery]It's a very family journey, and very intimate. But also a group one. Yesterday we had a ceremony at the abandoned Jewish cemetery in Zadonska Wola. It's the end of the world. A place with almost nothing. The dry bones, we said prayers and sang the song of hope.
Last night, we went to Krakow. Today we will march in the March of Life. This will require us to make a pretty serious transition from the strange family and community intimacy that has been created here - to the big festival that is here.
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