Przysucha: Israeli & Polish 3rd Annual Gathering
Contributors: Marla Raucher Osborn (owner), Piotr Kondrat, Tomek Zychla and 2 others
3 generations and 70 years on, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, born and raised in separate counties meet with a common purpose: to learn about a shared history that once defined the town of Przysucha. For 3 consecutive years, such encounters have been unfolding in late fall with the arrival of a group of students from two schools in Israel, a project founded and initiated by David Chernobilsky of Tel Aviv, teacher and himself a Przysucha Jewish descendant. The Israeli students’ counterpart on the Polish side is the Przysucha high school, a school that has had experience already in matters of dialogue, discussions of reconciliation, and study of local Jewish history and heritage.
Przysucha is a town that boasts a 350-year Jewish presence up until WW2; Jews accounted for 75% of the population. The Jewish cemetery survives: it is fenced and gated and contains three brick ohels. Though few headstones remain standing, the site has a growing collection of headstone fragments from recoveries in town; many of these headstone fragments are ornate and colorful. Their collecting point is behind the ohels. Przysucha also has Poland’s largest surviving baroque synagogue. It was built in the 18th century, not long after Jews arrived in the town, and until recently, it was the tallest structure in town save for the gothic-spired parish cathedral. As we learned today from the Polish students, Jewish families of Przysucha had to contribute to the cost of building the cathedral in exchange for the right to build the synagogue; they did, and the synagogue was completed in 1777.
Both Jewish cemetery and Przysucha synagogue are owned by the Foundation for the Preservation of Jewish Heritage in Poland (FODZ). After 6 long years of extensive structural stabilization and rehabilitation from foundation to roof, the synagogue is finally standing free of scaffolding and protective fencing as exterior renovation concludes. Applications to the Polish Ministry of Culture (a past supporter of the project) and other institutions inside and outside the EU are underway by FODZ to fund restoration of the magnificent cavernous interior with imposing bimah and colorful surviving frescoes. The hope is to someday soon open the synagogue again to the public, Jewish and non-Jewish.
The 3rd Annual Gathering in Przysucha this year included 55 Israeli students and an almost equal number of Polish students. In contrast, the first year’s gathering had a total of about 20; the second year’s, about twice that. Thanks to the continued involvement, commitment, and passion of a handful of teachers and school administrators – at both the Israeli and Polish ends – there is every reason to expect that next year’s get-together will be even bigger. And, the Polish students received an open invitation to come visit the Israeli schools, too.
Although English was the designated lingua franca, food, laughter, music, and dancing was the universal language for these teenagers. In keeping with Polish hospitality, an abundance of bread, fruit, vegetable, and dessert platters were spread out on two long banquet tables even before the two buses of Israeli students arrived from Lublin. After a brief
speech by David and his counterparts at the Polish school, mixing of the two groups began, at first a little hesitant but soon easy and jovial. This was then followed by a powerpoint slide and talk presentation by the Polish students about prewar Jewish Przysucha: families, trades, neighborhoods, markets, German occupation, ghettoization, deportation to Treblinka, and finally, the surviving sites of Jewish heritage (cemetery and synagogue).
The presentation was then followed by music and dancing in the school’s gymnasium which really served to mix the groups up and provide a more casual atmosphere for experiencing ‘the other’. Lots of laughter and lots of fun, both for participants and on-lookers, which included a number of other students and teachers who were not otherwise involved in the project.
From the school the crowd of about 80 walked then to the Jewish cemetery. For most of the Israeli students, this was the first time they – or any member of their family – had set foot in a Jewish cemetery in Poland since the war. A handful of Polish students spoke about the site and how they and their teacher have been working with Virtual Shtetl’s Memory In Stone program to read and translate the headstones and fragments. Several Israeli students proved very helpful in reading the Hebrew once the groups were inside the cemetery grounds exploring. The Polish students also provided photos of headstones and challenged the others (both Israeli and Polish) to find them. This time of year, there is a thick layer of fallen leaves so headstone fragments, otherwise quite visible to the naked eye, were quite hidden. Students were also given garbage bags to help pick up any bottles or rubbish they might find while exploring.
On David’s suggestion, the visit to the cemetery ended with students being given pencils, paper, and tacks to leave «memory messages » on the trees. What was written was left to the students to decide……
Together the group of about 80 then walked the few short blocks from the Przysucha Jewish cemetery to the synagogue, as mentioned, now fully visible from all sides, free of scaffolding and fencing. David delivered a brief but heartfelt history of the synagogue, its prominence in the town, importance to the Jewish community, and restoration process by FODZ, and then a young Israeli woman from the group sang a Yiddish song learned from her grandmother. All stood silent to hear her beautiful voice in a language not heard here for generations.
Many of the students exchanged email and Facebook information; surely some will continue to keep in touch. For many this was a day they will take back with them to Tel Aviv and Kfar Saba.
Like the messages they left on the trees, these students are now messengers of what they saw and heard, of what is happening here in Poland; and not just in Przysucha but in dozens of Polish schools.
se more pictures: Przysucha: Israeli Polish 3rd….
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