Our volunteer writing partners are people of different ages, life stages and religious, cultural and education backgrounds. They share the desire to learn more about the Holocaust and support survivors in telling their stories in the manner that was meaningful to them.
My writing partner, Sara (Sala), provided details that were very difficult for her to acknowledge, and in turn painful to hear. None of my grandparents had been in Europe during the war. My maternal grandmother had been fortunate enough to have a brother send for her in London, and from there she immigrated to Canada. She had family, though, who had remained in Europe, and she lost most of this family in the Holocaust. My grandmother, who was from Vilna, would not talk about her family’s wartime history. A dark cloud would transform her face as she said, “Hitler killed them all.” To hear Sara’s stories informed me in an intimate way what her family experienced, and by extension, what mine must have, as well, erasing that distance from me and providing a context for my understanding of the Holocaust.
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