Every year on Yom Hashoah/Holocaust Remembrance Day (April 18, 2023), I ask my students how THEY think this day should be commemorated. WE acknowledge the number of years which have passed since the Shoah and list options including: lighting yellow Yizkor candles, watching Holocaust-themed movies, hearing directly from survivors (two students were privileged to have 90 plus year old survivos come to their NYC schools this week), and more. I mentioned that some elect to fast; I showed the trailer of the film Paper Clips which introduces the Holocaust and the hard to imagine concept of 6 Million to non-Jewish students in a southern town.
This year, I shared video clips from the March of the Living including the singing of Hatikvah, the recitation of the Mourners Kaddish and speeches from Ambassador Tom Nides, Miriam Adelson, Robert Kraft and many others. One student was shocked when I shared the short speech of Iris Taib, granddaughter of a Holocaust survivor. Why was he surprised? Miriam, who appears to be Israeli and in her 30s, raised her sleeve to reveal a tattoo. “The Nazis gave you a tattoo. I wear it too. Number A10299. This is number is tattooed on my arm. Also in memory of your sister who never left this place. We say together, ‘Never Again.” Auschwitz concentration camp “prisoners” received tattoos at Auschwitz.
Seeing a tattoo of an Auschwitz survivor for the first time is jarring. I saw my first tattoo in 1984 when the kosher butcher in my college town was serving me delicatessen. My student heard of tattoos for prisoners, but the idea of her grandaugher electing to get a tattoo was similarly jarring.
My student and I have a lot to talk about and learn together in future lessons. Like many, this 12 year old is under the impression that Jewish people don’t have tattoos—unless they were Auschwitz survivors. For now, he has learned of an interesting trend of keeping the memory of the Shoah alive through replicating the tattoo of grandparents. I guess I need to soon tell him that many Israelis—not only relatives of survivors—have tattoos. And that Johnny Boy Tattoo at 28 Arlozoroff was hopping during the long Passover holiday. I won’t forget to add that they close early on Fridays and are closed all day on Shabbat!; closes early Fridays-by 3. What a wonderful and complex country!
(thanks to March of the Living for the photos and video footage from this year’s ceremony)
