The audiences was full of excitement and anticipation as we arrived on the beautiful, clear evening. The producer introduced the play with a brief history of the times, and a critic’s nasty (are we surprised) comments about the original production 40 years ago. He correctly drew parallels between those time and now, especially the the unpopular wars in Nam and Iraq, and the excruciating contrast of young people feeling empowered to oppose the war and speak out as compared to the general apathy today. It’s so very quiet when there is no draft and no daily photos of the war streaming into homes.

This show captures and reminded us of many of the the extreme contrasts and conflicts of the sixties, the pleasures and the pains, the freshness and the stupidities.

I am especially glad that they did not try to “update” or “adapt” the production for today. The book, music and spirit are still great.

The cast does a great job, full of beautiful energy, great voices, the band is great,  and at the end, many of the audience, us included, climbed on stage to dance with the cast for a reprise of Let the Sun Shine In.

Let’s do what we can to have “the sun shine in” for the November election.

Note for sixties grads: There is a special line for tickets for those older than 65. Check the Public Theatre website above for details. See, you managed to survive it all and now you do not have to sit on the grass for tickets if you don’t want to.

The lab itself is a wonderful expression of human creativity and imagination. The lab  studies the song of Zebra Finches. They breed in normal cages and the lab has refitted large picnic coolers into sound isolated environments, each with controlled light and fresh air to be used for specific studies and analysis. Each of these sound insulated coolers also has sound recording instruments installed inside. Stacks of these refitted coolers fill a large room. Hundreds of birds are in this room but they can just barely be heard. Each sound they make is electronically recorded and analyzed.  In an adjacent room, stacks of computers are used to save and analyze the data from the finch’s song. 

The purpose of this research is to understand the origins of human speech and the biological basis of speech.

Ofer played the a Veery song for us at very slow speed and it was a lovely melody in a major key. At normal speed it was a sweet chirp. Ofer told us about the work of David Rothenberg, author of Why Birds Sing: A Journey Into the Mystery of Bird Song. On David Rothenberg’s site, you can listen to the wonderful slowed down bird song.

Later I walked the around the campus and recalled my student days at CCNY and stood at the spot where thousands of students gathered to protest the invasion of Cambodia and to stop all classes in protest of our governments policies and actions.

But today, in spite of an unpopular war, the trashing of our constitution by the administration in Washington, despite the use of terrible torture that even our military opposes, now there were students just walking and birds singing in the sunshine of a lovely summer’s day…and a sign in front of Shepard Hall warning these very same students not to play frisbee or other sports on the lawns, supposedly for their safety.

 Red Tail Hawk on Shepard Hall of CCNY

We were greeted by Dan, the wirey and warm and charming head of the custom department and he took us through the large building which is divided into sections and cubby work stations, into the section of the factory devoted to custom production. 

Dan put the case on the table and our guitarist opened and saw his new instrument for the first time. Love, love at first sight and love, love at first play. A new instrument actually improves with time which is amazing to consider since this guitar has such a rich tone and is so responsive. The guitarist’s signature and date of birth are in-laid on the head and neck of his new guitar.

Then we took the tour of the factory. We started at the beginning, we passed the many different woods which are used in guitar making, ready to be cut , shaped and glued, and finished into an instrument. We passed through all of the different stages of the process.

The most moving aspect were the workers. The majority seemed to be women, although there were plenty of men as well. All focused on the particular skill. Making bridges, shaving interior braces, bending the pieces for the sides, assembling and gluing pieces, gluing in the carefully cut slivers of Mother-of-Pearl for decoration, sanding, finishing, etc.  Some looked up for a moment as we passed and smiled. The last people in the process test the guitars by playing them. This is their job…to play guitars all day…it is considered the best of all of the jobs. The factory is one of the two largest employers in Nazareth and some families have worked for generation at this factory.

Photos of famous guitarists holding their Martin’s line the factory walls, and the tour ends at a display of guitars that visitors may play and try out.

The factory building has a museum on the history of guitar making and the history of Martin guitars. There is also a shop selling lots of Martin paraphanalia but no guitars which are only sold through dealers and not directly from the factory. 

It is wonderful to see that skill and craft still exist, and that such a wonderful pleasure-giving instrument is made of a precious natural material, wood. The Martin factory believes that many woods used in guitar making will not be available in just a few years and they are developing instruments made of composite materials…

The Martin Guitar and the Martin Guitar Factory are an American treasure.

Link for The Daily Plant of the New York Park Department information is here. This links to photos of the construction of the waterfalls and the waterfalls in the evening.

The spectacular New York waterfalls that are upstate in Niagara  are dramatically, enormously larger and louder than the really lovely East River installation, so these waterfalls, as large as they are, are a bit like a painting of real waterfalls…a representation of waterfalls, made of metal and diverted naturally flowing river water, and therefore a large collage of the idea of waterfalls. Nice!.

One Waterfall is under the very beloved Brooklyn Bridge, a masterpiece in it’s own right.

Hopefully many people will go to the river to enjoy this exhibit- certainly on July 4 when the fireworks take over the river,  many more thousands of people will enjoy the Eliasson’s waterrfalls and hopefully the TV media will include some shots.

Also: For those  of you not very familiar with New York geology, the  East River is actually a tidal canal and does not have any natural waterfalls…does have lots of water traffic, birdlife and underwater life. The only natural waterfalls I know of in New York City are in the Bronx Zoo on the Bronx River.

The Actor’s Temple (339 West 47th Street in New York) is in an 90 year old, long narrow building on West 47th St in the Theatre District. This congregation was founded in 1917 by local business owners in what was then a very tough area of Hell’s Kitchen. The Rabbi and Cantor of that time, reached out to others working in the area-the theatre community of actors, comedians, writers working on Broadway,  in vaudeville, cabaret, nightclubs etc.  The membership also included singers, dancers etc.

These individuals made an enormous contribution to show business and the  shul was truly an “Actor’s Temple” at that time. The stained glass windows in the little shulare dedicated in memory of many famous performers, such as Sophie Tucker, and signed photos of the former members who were stars line the walls in the synagogue building. Just imagine spending the High Holidays with the Three Stooges, Edward G. Robinson, Red Buttons, and Sandy Koufax.

Now, the front of the shul has the traditional ark holding the Torahs,  and the eternal light, and stained glass dedication windows, but the shul also has a stage light scaffolding for performances held by the congregation as part of their programming. There is also a  long wall of mirrors for the dancers who rent the space for rehearsals during the week. These mirrors are covered by curtains during services.

The shul was full this past Friday with over 100 people for an eclectic evening.  First an excellent  Shabbat buffet dinner open to all which also drew some local residents who were happy to have a meal offered. This was held in the worn social hall below the sanctuary level and was sponsored by friends celebrating their anniversary.  

These friends can celebrate anywhere they choose but selected this community and this authentic old space which does not have one true right angle, has that awful old time faux “wood paneling,” an ¨improvement¨of the 1950´s and the autographed photos of the stars. In a few more years these odd historic spaces of New York City will have been eliminated and all replaced by modern condos. We have to relish them while they are still here.

After dinner, we went to the sanctuary for the Shabbat service led by a Rabbi-Cantor with a longer resume in opera and voice than in Rabbinics and a personal warmth con molto dramatic flare.

After the service, the aisle was suddenly transformed into a long, very narrow stage and two modern dancers performed Luxxury Suite by Heidi Latsky,  with Meredith Fages. Surprising and nice.

An extended family donated a baby grand piano to the shul and were thanked and celebrated. Very warm and really nice.

A cantata, The Seven Golden Buttons, written by the Rabbi Ira and Judith Eisenstein, and based on a Hasidic story attributed to the Baal Shem Tov, conducted by Jeanne Krausman, was performed with excellent spirit and fun by about a dozen singers and the newly dedicated piano was used for this performance, as well. This is one of six cantata´s that the Eisensteins wrote. Judith Eisenstein was a musical prodigy and the daughter of Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan the founder of the Reconstructionist movement. In 1923, she was the first woman to be Bat Mitzvah in America.

The Seven Golden Buttons is a story about true love and real value. Very nice and especially fitting for the anniversary celebrants.

This was not yet enough of an evening…after the cantata,  we all had kiddush (and more food) at the back of the sanctuary and some more time for schmoozing. Perfect.

The formal name of the congregation is Ezrath Israel, which means Helper of Israel.

The Times article puts Orange County NY, the home of Monroe, in the Catskills Region. The great and beautiful Catskill Region consists of Sullivan, Greene, Ulster and Delaware Counties.  If you have not visited the Catskills or the Daks (Adirondaks) which are much farther north, and are spectacular, you should research them and plan a trip.

The region the writer visited is called the Hudson Valley or sometimes the Hudson Highlands.  There is  a great deal to do and see in this area which is quite close to the city and very worthy of more than just a day-trip. If we stay awake instead of letting our minds go to mush, we can enjoy the landscape and sites.

It was the home and inspiration of the Hudson River School of painting and  is now home to the Storm King Art Center, Sugar Loaf, West Point, Bear Mountain, Woodbury Commons Outlet Mall, Harriman State Park, lovely organic farms, boat trips on the Hudson etc, etc, etc.

The vast majority of of New York State is made up of mountains, wilderness and small towns, then add in the the (really) upstate lakes such as Lake George, Schroon Lake,  Saranac, etc, and world class beaches of Long Island, the great lakes and Niagara and you have a tremendous variety and beauty close to home. Ok, you are correct, the Niagara region is a long drive and not so close to the city.

Real New Yorkers should venture outside of the city and visit our beautiful state.  The The NYState’s site, I Love NY State,  is an excellent source of information. 

If you look carefully at your tax return, you may notice that even though you live in NYC, you pay NY State taxes as well.  So, you have paid for many of the parks and sites, perhaps it is time to go visit your truly gorgeous real estate.

This historic, small synagogue has hosted the Andy Statman Trio for about 5 years.

If you haven’t been there before, you can expect absolutely transporting klezmer and blueglass by Brilliant Andy Statman, (my official title for him), and his trio in a warm, charming, real and unique setting, that is: a completely non-commercial setting.

This means that the time schedule isn’t so perfect, so if you arrive a bit early give a hand and help set up the chairs,  and check the performance dates as well on Andy’s website.

See my archive entry for a detailed discription and a photo of the outside of the little shul. Also, links.

If you attend, please let me know how it was since I will not be there tomorow. I will  be at a different concert of Sephardi and Mizrachi music, see my “upcoming events” for details. 

I will hear the Andy Statman Trio on a different evening.

Yesterday, well over 125 people attended the third public reading of WritopiaLab’s young writers under a tent in Bryant Park, which is adjacent to the main branch of the New York Public Library. This included writers, friends, family and park passers-by.

I am sure that Patience and Fortitude appreciated the patience and fortitude of the readers and listeners who sat through the rain and wind. It felt like an August day in San Francisco, bone chilling, but it was an inspiring and completely satisfying afternoon. I would not have been any where else.

Rebecca Wallace-Segall, the award-winning founder/Director of WritopiaLab, introduced each young writer before they read. We heard from young poets, short story writers, memoirists and a journalist. Many were award winners, many will surely be in the future.

Rebecca introduced some of the new writer/teachers who will lead up-coming workshops who were present, including the author Deborah Siegel.

Visit www.WritopiaLab.org, buy an anthology, buy a tee shirt, come to the next public reading.

The young writers of WritopiaLab will inspire you.

It was very moving to be there with singer-songwriter Debbie Friedman and Rabbi Simkha Weintraub of the National Center for Jewish Healing  as they lead a traditional Mincha (Afternoon) Service, right there in street with the blessed chaos of New York swirling near-by. Passers-by stopped to listen and watch. The rain came and went. Two trees for peace were symbolically planted.

Rabbi Gordon Tucker presented an excellent teaching based on a  a commentary on Israel’s Declaration of Independence developed by the RHR Human Rights Yeshiva in Jerusalem. His teaching and the RHR mission is clearly posted on their website.

It stregnthens hope to share this possitive and moving experience with friends, especially during these times which are so full of suffering and violence around the world.

Even though novelized versions of Holocaust stories always give me pause, since the telling of true stories of actual survivors are so moving and shocking and much more important to remember, I still found that this film of survival, the blessed actions of decent people, the effect of memory and loss, and intimacy was extremely moving, poetic and very worthwhile. 

The cast is wonderful and much of the film is shot in beautiful locations Greece, and in claustophobic apartment interiors. Good metaphor for the main character’s exterior and interior life.

Go see the film.

We saw this last night and we woke up still singing the wonderful score. This photo of Loretta Ables Sayre, terrific as Bloody Mary, was taken outside after the performance.

If you are not in New York, I would urge you to come to New York City just for this show. They have just extended the run “indefinitely”. See it very soon, before the production gets “old”. There are many reviews available on line. This is the link to the New York Times Review. Buy your tickets from the Beaumont Theatre box office in person or on line.

The Lincoln Center Plazas and the Julliard Building are all surrounded by “work sheds” during  the current extensive renovation, so access to the Beaumont Theatre  is through a makeshift, well lit path between construction.  

• Figuring out in whose home the Seders will be 
• the guest lists: trying calculate how many are actually coming and how many can possibly fit inside your home
• the menu: traditional vs new dishes
• the house cleaning which can feel like your are preparing to move 
• buying food and figuring out how to fit it in the fridge
• donations of food and funds for the needy
• planning a gift for the child who “finds” the hidden piece of Matzah needed to complete the Seder and express concretely the idea that what is lost or broken will be restored. The outcome of the Matzah search is completely rigged and all children will get a gift
• the arrival of the excited guests
• cleaning up either spilled wine, juice or something that breaks
• finding one more vase for the lovely gift of flowers
• the pleasure of all being together around the table celebrating the Seder with song, questions and laughter. It is our family custom to ask the Four Questions in as many languages as possible and this year a Muslim Iraqi quest asked them in Arabic, a first for us.
• guests helping to disassemble the extra tables and chairs (thank you, again)
• Matzah Brie for breakfast(!)
• blessed friends who  invite you for another Passover meal to spend together during the week of the holiday

• and going out for Pizza to celebrate the end of the holiday and the return of such a humble food we can take so for-granted…bread.

The sum of this effort is so much more than any of the parts: a great sense of wholeness,  a renewal of connectedness to family and friends, a renewal of the connection of tradition and the present, the presence of Spring and the feeling of inner freedom.

Happy Passover

I have attended past public readings of these young, articulate, insightful writers and can tell you they will move and surprise you with their accomplishments as writers.  

 “Dear family, friends, and fans of local young writers,Writopia Lab’s writers have been arduously developing short stories, memoirs, op-eds, scripts, and poetry over the past six months and are thrilled to finally share them with you at Bryant Park on Sunday, May 18th, from noon to 3:00pm! Please find an invitation attached to extend to anyone you wish. There will be seating for over 100 and a tent set up in case of rain. This is a celebration. Our middle and high schoolers have garnered more regional and national awards from Scholastic’s Art & Writing Awards than any other group of students in the country. And the amazing truth is this: Even those who did not win regional or national awards this year submitted exceptional work. All of us at Writopia Lab are so proud of each and every one of our writers.Our youngest writers (ages 9-13) will read from noon to 1:30pm. Our teens will read from 1:30-3:00pm. Please feel free to come and go as you wish. “Bryant Park is between 6th Avenue and the main branch of the Public Library, between 40th and 42nd streets in Manhattan.

Gianni Longo, in A Guide to Great American Public Places, called the park:

“…one of the most sensual, graceful open spaces in New York City.”

The park’s site includes a webcam.

The school’s website states the school’s purpose and focus:

Horace Mann has changed in many ways but remains steadfastly dedicated to five core values: The Life of the Mind, Mature Behavior, Mutual Respect, A Secure and Healthful Environment, and A Balance between Individual Achievement and a Caring Community.

If there is any truth in the article it would mean that the Horace Mann School has utterly failed in achieving it’s own stated goals.

This brings up some important issues that go far beyond the shockingly bad behavior of a privileged elite that sees itself as entitled to be served and catered to no matter what it does or says.

First: How and why did the City of New York help fund a wealthy private school by issuing a bond when the public schools suffer? How dare they? How many other private schools have been helped this way? Why exactly, was this school helped by the city government?

Second: Look at how this group considers everyone, even professionals such as educators, to be their servants and “hired help”. And this is what they have modeled for their children.

Third: Isn’t there a relationship between the attitude and values taught by this elite and those who feed the extreme disrespect for women which we see in the media in this current presidential campaign? And they have DEFENDED racism as well?

Fourth: Why would anyone send a daughter to this school?

Fifth: How many other private schools behave this way?

New York City is full of wonderful, talented, smart and really goods kids who deserve a good education and preparation for the future. We must support public education as the cornerstone to a healthy, creative, productive society and a continuing good future. Public School should not be treated as an “entitlement program” to be disrespected and underfunded.

Parents should teach children the core value of respect for teachers by their very own behavior.

Money never buys class.

………

Comment by NYCGUY:

A few years ago, while crossing Broadway on the Upper West Side, I overhead the conversation of a young boy and his father.

The child expressed a desire to copy the career of his favorite teacher and his parent replied that that would be an inappropriate pursuit.

To hear something like that and in such a neighborhood was utterly shocking. So maybe the esteem I had learned for Horace Mann was equally ill-placed. This is, after all, an epoch of an all voluntary armed forces subject to stop loss, which is nothing other than involuntary servitude, serfdom if one wishes to give it a polite name.

What really got me was the story inside the story about this prestigious private, tax exempt school getting a substantial tax free loan from the city’s so-called Economic Development Corporation, facilitated by the city’s corporation counsel under its preceding mayor for whom this chap remains a loyal business partner.

This perfectly legal transaction whereby EDC makes like the NYS Dormitory Authority for very high tuition K-12 private schools - parochial schools included - is a hallmark of the current mayoralty that just happens to have saddled Horace Mann with considerable debt.

Ostensibly the beneficiaries provide an undefined high level of scholarships and public service. Apparently, the private schools are better integrated than the city’s own public schools - which have no boards with any effective parental input - because, obviously, they’re creaming from the body of perspective students.

Lost in this is that public schools are intended to create an educated citizenry and that the city is using its federally capped industrial revenue bond authority to benefit elite institutions not subject to endless teach-to-testing while its own system has cut back capital expenditures for school renovations  and new construction. Is something amiss?

Maybe the Horace Mann students understand the “respect” they’re given does not accrue to their teachers or perhaps even the gifted scholarship classmates.

NYCGUY

We ferried out to Ellis Island. What a pleasure it is to be out on the water of the harbor on a cool, clear day. Although Harbor Seals have been spotted as far north as the 79th Street Boat Basin  this season, we did not spot any in the water that Sunday but enjoyed seeing the city, The Statue  of Liberty, and the soaring gulls and many Brandts.

Ellis Island opened a new, temporary exhibit on March 30, 2008, called “Visas for Life” which documents in photos, the extraordinary efforts of many diplomats during the Holocaust to use the power of their offices to issue visas for Jews fleeing Nazi control. They did this against the orders of their superiors and risked a high personal price for their actions. They saved many hundreds of thousands people from being murdered by their moral and courageous action. It is a very worthwhile exhibit. 

I attended as a representative of Remember the Women Institute and serve on the Advisory Board.

There is a wonderful portrait of Chiune Sugihara, the Japanese Consul to Lithuania and his wife, who saved more than 10000 Jews.

Many current diplomats and the families of rescuers, and a few survivors attended the opening event and their stories where told, and awards of thanks and recognition were made.

The Italian diplomat spoke so well when he said that “diplomats are not generally known for being courageous or brave but of hoping for a comfortable assignment”. Several family members of a Papal Nuncio who helped rescue many Jews travelled from Italy to accept an award in his honor and spoke with great warmth and emotion.  The niece of Raoul Wallenberg attended. The Swiss diplomat spoke so refreshingly frankly about what Switzerland had done wrong as well as right during the Nazi period. Seated next to us where diplomats from Germany. We spoke personally with Bill Bingham, pictured above, Hiram Bingham IV’s son, about the role of his father in issuing American visas and saving many people, and how this limited his father’s diplomatic career.

It was an event filled with good feeling, and extremely moving stories of how people can make an extraordinary difference by acting in good conscience. An event which truly affirmed the power of good in people.

Afterwards, the honorees, families, attendees and diplomats, waited on line with the general  public and ordered their lunch at the fast food cafeteria in the museum.

Welcome to modern America.

These gleaming, graceful candlesticks are absolutely not for sale.

They have no price.

They were made and purchased in Europe and my beloved Grandmother z”l brought them with her when she and her family traveled by ship across the Atlantic, as they came to start their new life of freedom in New York City.

The candlesticks were made between about 1880 and 1900 in Poland which was under under Czarist rule at that time. The family (and the candlesticks) were very lucky to get here.

On holidays, such as Passover, my grandmother used these tall candlesticks, which she placed on the long white lace tablecloth and they gleamed! She also had a shorter pair she used for each Shabbat, which my cousin now owns.

Over time, the silver had become so worn with use and many polishings that they needed the skill of a silversmith to restore the silver for more generations of enjoyment.

After a good deal of research, I found a silversmith that I could trust with this job. His shop is a narrow, grimy, old building, squeezed between larger old buildings just off of Times Square. Since New York is constantly renewing itself, you know as you step into the teeny space that functions as a “lobby” that within just a few years this will be torn down and a gleaming tower will stand on this spot.

His shop is a pleasant mess of work waiting to be done, being done, waiting to be picked up. They were ready to be taken home, as promised, in just a week. He did a splendid job.

Soon enough, the candlesticks will regain the more subtle, burnished look of use.

On the Upper West West, we had both happy Purim celebrators, and solemn street processions, originating from local churches were in the streets carrying effigies, crucifixes and even a mock coffin.

We spend Purim eve in the wonderful, pleasant, unpretentious, chaos of Congregation Ansche Chesed. The service for young children was packed with families and many young Queen Esthers, Mordachais, kings and others like 5 year old Batman (who loved his costume and paraded back and forth in front of the young Esthers). The adult service had stranger costumes, and the “scotch club”  circulated offering shots. Fun!

The next day, Purim and Good Friday, I went with a friend to the historic Spanish and Portuguese Synagoguebut we learned that we had missed the morning service. The cantor, Rabbi Rohde, gave us the most generous Purim gift: he read the entire megillah (story of Esther) for us in a beautiful, historic side chapel. A friend of his and her young daughter joined us there. He did this for the four of us. What a generous and kind man! This congregation is always welcoming but this was extaordinary.

So, on this day, both traditions mixed easily and comfortably. In the difficult history of the past in Europe, Good Friday was often a day for attacks on Jews. My mother who was born in Poland, told us that on Good Friday they were not allowed outdoors by their parents in order to keep them safe. Thankfully, we live in quite a different world.

Queen Esther and Easter, names from an even older religious past of the ancient Earth Goddess of the mid-east, met and got along just fine on today’s the Upper West Side.

Many have seen the lovely artist’s rendering of 535 West End avenue as it appears in many ads and asked about a photo, so here it is: a photo of the actual construction site taken on March 19, 2008, which was a gray and very rainy day.

Notice the sign which says “21st Century Pre-War Residences”?  in New York’s housing market, “pre-war” usually means it was built before World War II, but clearly the builders of 535 West End mean to say something else by using this phrase.  Notice the people with umbrellas and peace signs? These are West Siders assembling for a silent solemn march to protest and mark the fifth anniversary of the war in Iraq. Makes one wonder what the builders know about wars…hmmm…

(See posting of January 17, 2008 for more about this building)

The protesters walked silently down Broadway from 86th Street and a few hundred protesters assembled at Verdi Square, at Broadway between 72nd and 73rd Street. It is a small triangular slip of a “square” and has a Carrara marble monument to the composer Verdi with his characters Falstaff, Leonora of La Forza del Destino, Aida, and Otello, some trees and bushes, and a long subway entrance structure.  Evening subway commuters arriving home in the rain, rushed past on their way home through the large crowd.

It was a silent, older and peaceful group, and the statue of Verdi was not toppled, of course. The great composer’s beautiful foray into the Middle East was some time ago and still sometimes features elephants but never trains.

Also, as an attorney and as a prosecutor, he must have known that when pimps and prostitutes are arrested, they cooperate with the authorities and give up the names of all of their contacts. Yet, he did this anyway.

He risked blackmail, legal charges, loosing family and public respect. Yet, he did this anyway.

How was able to receive security clearance?

He made New York State, and whoever was in charge of giving him security clearance, look as foolishly corrupt as New Jersey.

Hopefully, David A. Paterson will be a good governor.

Both pose the question of what is moral behavior under the most extreme immoral conditions of a concentration camp during the Shoah (Holocaust).

Our society is so based on the individual, we tend to want to focus this question on an individual’s behavior and choices but what emerges in both works is how the sum of the behaviors of individual actions adds up to something much more than what any one person does. In The Counterfeiter, we are in the male barracks of the Nazi concentration camp, Sachsenhausen,  in the unique prisoner blocks dedicated to conterfeiting currency. *More on this camp and the specific barrack blocks later.

The lead character, Solly,  a Jewish counterfeiter, goes by his moral code: never be a rat even if you can’t stand the other guy, do anything to keep alive and help others stay alive. Adolf, the communist prisoner has a different code: don’t cooperate with the Nazis and sabotage the counterfeiting work, come what may and perhaps martyrdom is an honorable outcome. This code could easily enrage the Nazis to kill them all. The other inmates depicted just try to stay alive. 

In the end, both of these  points of view are needed by the group for moral and physical survival.

In this film, the “criminal” Solly is much more likable and much less frightening than the ”high-minded” Adolf. The Nazis are portrayed correctly as collectively dispicable, the worst of the worst, of course. Thankfully, there is no trace of any romanticizing  of them or of their motives. No individual action “overcomes” their collective guilt.

This excellent film is very worth seeing and deserves its award.

Who Will Carry the Word, was written by  Charlotte Delbo who was a survivor. The Red Fern Theatre Company partnered with the Remember the Women Institute for this production.

By contrast, we are in the women’s barracks of Auschwitz. These women do not have any skill such as counterfeiting, that they might be able to play for survival’s sake. They are trapped and helpless. Much of the overt dialog of the play involves the question of how to retain the will to live and whether to retain the will to live. What emerges is the way these women try to support and comfort each other. Again, the collective actions surpass any one individual’s action.

This was the first event on the Shoah I have attended in which much of the audience was young, and many probably were not Jewish. After the play, a camp survivor, Bronia Brandman, told her moving, harrowing, determined story of survival as a young pre-teen (and of becoming a teenager) and took questions afterwards. She was asked “Do you believe in God?” and replied with her family’s history which includes descent from illustrous Rabbis, and her love and devotion to Judaism and Jewish culture.

This was tremendously moving. She is an excellent soft-spoken  speaker, and a woman able to convey her experiences and emotions. She is a docent at the Museum of Jewish Heritage a Living Memorial to the Holocaust in Battery Park, New York City, and she speaks regularly to school groups. Some in the audience said that this was their first experience meeting an actual survivor.

The film, play and museum are all very, very worthwhile.

If you haven’t ever spoken with a survivor, try to do so before one can not do so any longer- time is running out as they age.

More on this camp and these specific barrack blocks: I will add  the fascinating experiences of  Remember the Women colleagues who visited the precise barracks depicted in the film.  I should receive the comments in a day or two.

Here are Bronia Brandman, Rochelle Saidel, and  the Red Fern Theatre’s, Melanie Williams and Emilie Miller.

Photo courtesy of the Red Fern Theatre Company

The site is very hilly, wooded land, with lots of varied terrain.  The 50 or so adult dogs barked and jumped non-stop in excitement until they were hitched up in teams to the sled . We called “Alley, alley- oop!” and they took off, and started to run.  They became silent and happily ran hard. We were two people per sled and six exited dogs per team.

It was like a roller-coaster ride through the snow! Up and down hills and spinning around many turns- fun and exiting! Put this on the “bucket list”.

The next day we snow-shoed through the woods and filled our extended hands with sun-flower seeds and Chickadees came down from the trees and ate out of our mittens. It was a sweet reward for bundling up and going out into the winter.

On the way back to NYC, we stopped off in Montreal for just a day and went to their Beaux Arts Museum to see the retrospective of Cuban Art. The show was fascinating, well installed and there were many fine pieces but the most striking thing is to see anything at all about current Cuban culture. We have been embargoed too. When will we start a new relationship with Cuba? 

During our drive back to New York City, we realized that we take upstate New York  much too forgranted, even though the state is so beautiful. So we will plan a future warm weather trip to the Finger Lakes Region.

Go to www.CentralPark.com  for a photo of the sculpture in Central Park of the famous hero sled dog Balto and his story.

First we drove through the Hudson Valley and the rolling hills and long ridges of the Hudson Highlands which had some snow on the ground and we realized that the color of the light has started to change towards a spring color. There were no “signs of Spring”, just that change of light quality with the lengthening day. It was a feeling of fading winter with Spring just waiting.

Then we passed through the Shawangunks, pronounced “shan-gums” and known as the “Gunks”, with sleeping snowy apple orchards, and frozen water streams on the mountains until we came to the Catskill region and then to the Adirondacks, “the Daks”, beautiful mountains and valleys and we knew there was indeed Winter here.  There are fields of snow-covered frozen haystacks, creeks running down frozen snow banks on the mountains.

The placenames are so great, from Dutch, Native American, French and English and many other sources:

Niskayuna, Schroon Lake, Fort Ticonaroga, Saranac Lake, Cairo (say Kay-Row), with Lake Pharoah nearby, Paradox (population 14), AuSable Chasm which was frozen-closed for the winter, Troy, Albany, Loon Lake and Brandt Lake, Lake Champlain and Lake George, Watervliet, Rotterdam, Hague, Kaaterskill Falls and the Hurleys.

We reached the border and entered Quebec Province in Canada and all of the road signs warned us ” It’s winter, be careful” in French.

We had “officially” found the winter…and then the winter found us.

We continued past Montreal up to the Laurentians, which look like the Daks, and as we drove we were overtaken by a full winter blizzard of snow and freezing rain. We took the roadsigns advice and we went very slowly as did the other drivers on the icy, slippery road. We arrived in icy-snowy village of Mont-Tremblant well after dark.

We have spent a day exploring the mountain and ski area, and another day enjoying a new snow fall of about 6 inches of huge, fluffy flakes that made very nice snow for snow-balls and snow-people…

…the beloved snow of childhood.

Next few days: We will snow-shoe through a Canadian National Park, stopping to warm up and feed the birds, and then go out Dog-sledding. Very, very exiting.

Three generations of women are depicted, each with a distinct set of expectaions and coping skills which reflect their changed status in society over time. The film is engrossing and entertaining and will be shown in NYC again in March.

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I Got No Jeep and My Camel Died  and Souvenirs, are both documentary road-trip films with father-and-son relationship themes but are they feel extremely different.

 I Got No Jeep and My Camel Died  is a desert road-trip, with jeeps and camels, and a stop in Brazil(!). It is the personal musical journey of Yair Dalal filled with absolutely splendid music. Yair Dalal is a World Music star and you can hear his music on his site.

Souvenirs an entertaining and moving  father and son road-trip film about  truth and memory. Travel starts in Israel, through Italy, and Germany to Holland and takes us through 60 years of a father’s stories to the source of his experience. The end is wonderful.

Photo by Jeff French Segall

ASYV is based on the model of the Israeli Youth Aliyah Village of Yemin Orde which was established in 1953 to accommodate Holocaust orphans and immigrant children and several groups and agencies are involved in this excellent project.

The visitors met with the synagogue members at Congregation Ansche Chesed, an Upper West Side Synagogue, and discussed the school and their hopes for the future for both the children and for their country.  They are survivors of the Rwandan genocide. A synagogue member was able to link them to an organization which provides computers to third world schools for only $100 each. This was good news. All help is appreciated.

As we had lunch, elderly members of the congregation, who are Holocaust survivors, walked up and  simply patted the visitors gently…all understood without the need for any additional words.