Revisiting the Holocaust before Encountering the Ukraine Crisis

Yesterday I visited Budapest’s Dohany Street Synagogue, the largest in Europe. It is a grand design, reminiscent a bit of a European opera house, with the multi-tiered balconies on each side. It is in the midst of what was the Budapest (Jewish) Ghetto of WWII. When the city was liberated from the Nazis (by the Soviet armed forces) there were many dead bodies still on the streets. They were quickly buried on the grounds of the synagogue. They remain a monument to the cruelty man is capable of.

There is also a metallic Tree of Life on the grounds, with more than 10,000 metal “petals,” each inscribed with the name of a Holocaust victim (only a small fraction of the Hungarian Jews who perished). Actor Tony Curtis (father of Jamie Lee) was a driving force in that project. His parents were emigrants from Austria and Slovakia. (His mother was born in a Slovak village not far from Kosice, where I will be.)

There are also reminders of the good man is capable of. The garden is dedicated to Raoul Wallenberg, the Swedish diplomat, and other “Righteous Gentiles,” who helped save many Jews from deportation. Each of the names on the plaque has a remarkable story of bravery and heroism. I suggest you pick just one, google him and learn his story.

The train into Kosice is about 3.5 hours (from Budapest). I will be meeting with the local Rotary chapter tomorrow. It has been on the cutting edge of refugee relief efforts, both helping those who have reached their city and supplying provisions across the border to western Ukraine.

I met a Ukrainian girl on the train, in her final year of medical school in Uzhhorod, the Ukrainian city on the border with Slovakia (and sister city of Corvallis, OR, though she tells me they call it “brother city”). It is less than an hour from Kosice. She has been studying for Finals. But with the sirens constantly going off, studying in the bomb shelters was difficult. So she visited relatives in Hungary and got her studying done there. Now she is going back to Ukraine.