Somehow it almost seems wrong that this project should be coming to a close. On one hand, I have to admit it's a bit of a relief. I spent a good chunk of my semester working out how to contact Sarah, then being nervous about what to say and do, and then freaking out about what to include in the narritive and wondering how accurate our notes were since both Carly and I got so wrapped up just listening to Sarah's story. On the other hand, for a story so singular and important (as is the story of every survivor and even every non-survivor) I feel like it has very suddenly all come to a close. I wish it would have been possible to set up more interviews, but varying schedules and my great lack of a car made this near impossible.
Despite all the troubles however, I am immensely happy that I was able to take part in this project. How often does one get the chance to meet somebody as amazing as Sarah and talk about such a singular experience as the Holocaust? So far in my life I can count the number of experiences like this on one finger. It is definetly something I will never forget (or if for some reason I do, I have this handy blog to remind me off all the details) and I feel blessed to have been given this oppurtunity.
As Carly and I found out in our interview, there is a lot more to Sarah than her experience as a survivor. She too was once a young girl who liked to go out dancing and shopping (and from the looks of her house, still does). She's had children, traveled the world, been in love and been married. She's a fascinating exmaple of how despite history, life goes on. Behind the stories that we all want to hear or need to hear, survivor's lives are not always so very different from our own. I sincerely hope that I can meet with Sarah again some day. I would love to sit down with her without the brimming weight of a project and the need to take notes. Perhaps she could teach me how to play bridge.
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I am sad this project is coming to a close too. I wish we could do more with our survivors or talk to them more. Because my survivor, Miriam, is coming out with a book about her story very soon, I couldn't publish her story as a narrative for my project. However, I chose to do a poem that captured the essence of her feelings towards her Holocaust experience. I was freaking out about what to write about too because I really didn't know how I can appropriately present the feelings that came out of her when I interviewed her. How can you capture it in words?
ReplyDeleteThis project has been one of the most interesting ones I've ever done for school because I actually get to hear first-hand experience of such a big event in history. The Holocaust has always been something I read about in books or watched in movies. But THIS-- interviewing and getting to know a Holocaust survivor-- is what I think to be the first time I've actually really learned about the Holocaust beyond the facts and details of the event in its history.