Guest Speaker

Guest Speaker

[Name of the Writer]

[Name of the Institution]

Guest Speaker

Holocaust was a tragedy that many people in German-occupied Europe endured. It was one of the acts that obliterated around six million Jews. Holocaust brought limitless pain and suffering to the whole Jewish community. Over the years, the survivors of Holocaust are fading away and their biggest fear is that the younger generations are forgetting the story behind that tragedy (Generation of the Holocaust, 1982). Eileen Wolfe was an outstanding woman when she came by our classroom to tell her story. She really went into depth about her experience as a Holocaust survivor and she also explained how it altered her life.

Eileen Wolfe’s Presentation

Eileen Wolfe is a speaker from Chhange who spoke about her life during Holocaust. She opened up about her family and the difficulties they faced during that time. Her family belonged to Poland until 1900 when her father accompanied the Judaist emigrants who were rushing from Poland with his eight children. Germany was a prosperous and welcoming country during those days that encouraged them to settle in Berlin. Unfortunately, this facility also had exception for Jews because Nuremberg laws neither did allow Jew kids to attend school nor their parents to do business with non-Judaists. The Jews who were already short in numbers were not able to meet their basic needs by doing business inclusively within the community. Such inhumane marginalization was to keep this community under thumb. They settled in Israel during 1930s what they were obliged to do. They could not find peace in their religious epicenter also. The Jew buildings and Churches were attacked and their religious scriptures were burned during November 1938. Her father was sent back to Poland and Wolfe was kept in Germany with her mother to get a visa for the familial reunion. The miseries did not end and they kept their struggle continue, they happened in Cuba after a few years where they reunited but unfortunately captured along with their community. They all were loaded in a ship and were supposed to shifted to Germany but the crew captain told them that they all will be drowned. They asked them to shift them to America but America did not give consent. Suddenly, it was reported that the four European countries including England and France had consented to welcome them. The Jews preferred England and settled there. Wolfe and her family spent most of the time in bomb-shelters. She shifted to America after the war ended and has been living here with her family since then. Wolfe revealed that she remained haunted by the experiences she had during Holocaust and it took many years for her to believe that she was no more a victim to that miserable torture and humiliation. Her book The Night of Broken Glass: Eyewitness Accounts of Kristallnacht was published in June, 2012 that portrays the state of misery of the Jews during Holocaust (The Night of Broken Glass, 2012).

My Personal Reaction to the Presentation

I was inspired by the story of Eileen Wolfe. She reminded me the pathetic story of another survivor of the same tragedy Viktor Emil Frankl. Viktor Frankl also shared his struggle to sustain his senses during those horrific concentration camps that inspired me a lot, but the story of Wolfe appears more inspiring because of her gender. It is near to impossible for a young girl to go through imprisonment torture. Moreover, that was a torture more than imprisonment. Concentration camps were a place where many people were kept in small tents with little food (Viktor Frankl's Logotherapy, 2000). They were continuously hit, punched, abused, and tortured by the soldiers. They had little outfits to wear in that German cold. Additionally, the experience of being smuggled from country to another with little hope of life was above than all. Millions of Jews died because of psychological illness. Wolfe appeared as a fictional hero in my mind when I left the classroom. I had not believed such stories by the individuals, if there were no historical witnesses to Holocaust. Holocaust is a stain on the face of humanity that cannot be erased easily. Our young generations must learn and understand the motifs and consequences of Holocaust, so we might avoid such brutalities against humanity in future.

Reference

The Night of Broken Glass, Eyewitness Accounts of Kristallnacht. (2019). European Review Of History: Revue Europeenne D'histoire. Retrieved from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13507486.2013.773741?journalCode=cerh20

Viktor Frankl's Logotherapy: Spirituality and Meaning in the New Millennium. (2019). TCA Journal. Retrieved from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15564223.2000.12034561

Generation of the Holocaust , (1982). Psycnet.apa.org. Retrieved 2 November 2019, from https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1991-97188-000