This March break, 11 students and two faculty members are traveling to Berlin, Prague, and Krakow to explore the idea of monuments and memorials and their role in public memory, and learn more about the Holocaust and how Germany, Czechoslovakia, and Poland responded in the late 20th century and early 21st century to the study of Holocaust memory, public art, and their fusion in contemporary life. Please enjoy the blog post below from Bright ’28 and Sophie ’27 where they share their experiences exploring Prague’s Jewish history, stunning architecture, and powerful Holocaust memorials, reflecting on the resilience of the past and the beauty of the present through music, art, and remembrance.
Today’s content was less intensive than yesterday’s, when we visited Terezin. Terezin, really, really hit me hard. We started our day by visiting four Jewish synagogues, the most impressive of which was the Spanish Synagogue. The structure’s dome-shaped roof, which contained a skylight, was neatly decorated with gold, blue, and orange. On the second floor of the Spanish synagogue, we read about famous Jewish Czechs who fought for the underground liberation forces of the fallen Republic of Czechoslovakia during the Second World War.
After lunch, we headed to Prague Castle, which contained the famous St. Vitus church, which had taken nearly 600 years to build. Visiting St. Vitus church, in fact, is on my life’s bucket list. Therefore, as I approached the church, I tried to keep my head down until I was at the very bottom of the church. After arriving at the base of the church, I slowly raised my head, and I was thrilled by the height and mass of the church. It was an unforgettable experience, and I kept on “wowing”. The colored stained glass windows within the church were also astonishing. As the sun passed through the glass, the colored glass “shot” their beautiful hue on the church’s wall; this added a sense of liveliness to the seriousness and solemnness of the church.
At night, my five other friends and I went to listen to a 1-hour performance by the Prague Orchestra. I thought I was going to fall asleep because last time I went to listen to an orchestra, which was 3 years ago, I couldn’t stay focused. But this time, things were very different. Throughout the concert, I listened closely to how the soothing cello and double bass set off the melodic, high-pitched violins. I had my eyes fixed on the double-bassist and celloist. Time and music flew by, and I felt fulfilled. This interaction between the different instruments of an orchestra, which I have never observed before, was magical. It was a perfect ending for my day. -Bright ’28
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After a good night’s sleep in the Hotel Royal in Prague, we were all eager to see more of the city. Seeing Prague for the first time on our boat tour yesterday showed us all how beautiful the city was. We started the day with group breakfast and then went on a walking tour all morning of the old Jewish neighborhood in the city. We got to see the oldest synagogue in Prague that the tour guide claimed was the oldest still in use in Europe! We also went into a synagogue that was memorialized for the Czech Jews who had died in the Holocaust, and on the walls was written their town, name, and the year they were born and died. It was incredibly moving to see how much space all of these names take up and shows how every person murdered was not just part of a number, but had an individual identity. There was also a small museum that had the artwork of children who were persecuted in the town and concentration camp Terezin. The drawings were buried underground for a period of time so they would not be destroyed by Nazis, and were made by the 15,000 Jewish children who passed through Terezin. Out of that number, only about 250 survived, and reading about how these children mostly died at the ages of ten or eleven was horrifying. The drawings we saw were a focus in the play we read in preparation of the trip, I Never Saw Another Butterfly, and the main character, Raja, actually had a drawing and a scrapbook we saw in the exhibit. The drawings themselves were all very interesting and showed how different children grappled with living in the Jewish Ghettos and Terezin Prison. There were drawings of life at the camp, life before the camp, everyday objects, what they imagined life would be like after the camp, and so many others. It was disturbing to see the Jewish children’s hopes and dreams and plans for going home when so many of them would never get to grow up and achieve what they had drawn.
After leaving the exhibit, we went outside of the synagogue to the oldest Jewish cemetery. There are over 12,000 gravestones visible, but there are an estimated 40,000-60,000 people who were buried there, because there wasn’t any other space. The graveyard isn’t small, but not large enough to space out, so the graves are often less than inches apart and not evenly spaced. It is quite beautiful actually to see all of the people who shared a community and are buried together. We also learned from our tour guide that they did not put any names on tombstones, only the good deeds of who was buried there. We then walked to the Spanish synagogue, which is so beautiful and has such unique architecture. There are many motifs decorating the interior, and there is gold paint that was used in every detail. From the ceiling, a beautiful chandelier shaped like the Star of David hangs down below a circular skylight that brings in natural light to the space. It was wonderful to get to experience and see traditional, and old Jewish structures, because in almost every other European city, they were destroyed in World War II. Our tour guide was able to explain that it was because Hitler wanted to make a museum to show how the Jewish people had lived, after he had exterminated them. We also learned why Prague was never bombed or destroyed in the same way Berlin was because Hitler loved the beautiful architecture and wanted to keep it so he could visit and live in Prague after the war. We also discovered that Prague actually was bombed once by an American pilot, but it was by mistake. He was flying to Dresden on a foggy and cloudy day and thought that Prague was Dresden, so he bombed part of the city. The damage was minimal though because it was only one pilot who made the mistake.
This morning was so interesting, and for me I felt that seeing the drawings of the children, and the old town of Prague was able to better show how people lived before the Holocaust. I also now better understand what we talked about at the MFA before we even left Boston, about the individuality of the victims of World War II and seeing what life must have been like for them. – Sophie ’27
