"If the Messiah is coming, plant the tree first"

Day #9

[Thank you all for understanding these posts now come after we’ve returned. Due to technical difficulties and the pace of our itinerary, I was not able to post these reflections in time. Keep reading, though - it gets better!]

Today we began with our visit to Yad Vashem. The museum was updated in 2005 so this was a first time experience for all of us. While we waited for our appointed time to enter the museum we walked around some of the monuments including the hall of the eternal flame. There we memorialized our experience with the El Maley Rachamim prayer as we looked on the floor at the names of the death camps etched into stone. The children’s memorial remains the most touching monument for the 1.5 million children who lives were cut down by the Nazi perpetrators. Standing outside the memorial there were butterflies. We read the poem, “I never saw another butterfly,” and captured the essence of our purpose at Yad Vashem – we come to remember because we are still alive and must bear witness.

The museum itself is a large and long triangular structure where the majority of the museum is angled downward until the final display that leads you back up again. You are directed through a very specific experience, beginning with the Nazis rise to power to the records and testimonials of survivors, and culminated in a display of righteous gentiles. The final room is a reflective pool and massive cone portraying the vibrant lives of the victims and the pool to reflect our own faces to remind us that we could have been victims too. It is an equally powerful image to stand in a circular room lined with shelves of memory books – each book a record of one victim’s life. While the shelves are still quite empty, 2 million [number of known victims to date] is an impressive number to behold.

We concluded our visit with a meditation and recitation of Kaddish. We sang Oseh Shalom overlooking the Judean hills together for a touching moment in reverence and loving memory of our ancestors who suffered at the hands of the Nazis and the promise to never forget was etched in our memories anew.

We left Yad Vashem for Har Herzl, the Israeli national cemetery. Walking through the gardens and paying our respects to the leaders of the State was awe-inspiring. We just touched the surface of the soldier’s cemetery where thousands of young men and women lay in service to the Jewish people’s quest for peace, but clearly recognized how each and every individual whose grave is present there is significant and not forgotten. We did not enter the new museum there, but we heard it is a must see….next time!

Juxtaposing Yad Vashem and Har Herzl seemed heavy at first, but we culminated our experience by planting trees in the Aminadav forest on the outskirts of the Judean Hills. We were greeted by the eccentric American expatriate Kabbalistic nature guy (What was his name? It was his large,, rainbow colored kippah, scraggly beard and guitar that we remember) who gave us a choice of rosemary, almond trees, and “Ayla” trees to plant. We all found our way to the area near the road and nurtured our little saplings into the ground. We gathered as a group on the roadside and heard a story told by Julia Dick about the man who blessed the tree who had everything – fruit, shade, leaves, etc. – with the blessing that the trees offspring should be just like it. After visiting the Holocaust memorial and the cemetery for Israel’s fallen, our tree planting was a validation that we are thriving and growing in the Land! Am Yisrael Chai!

After a brief visit to the Knesset and a view of the impressive Supreme court building from the outside, we returned to the hotel for a few hours of free time and shopping.

Due to the immense popularity of the Western Wall tunnels museum we were scheduled to visit tonight at 9:00 p.m. Even though we were absolutely tired and had traveled enough by this time, the tunnels museum was completely energizing. Besides the gigantic rock in the Western Wall that you first see when you enter into the museum, the latest innovation are some expertly placed flat screen TV’s to watch video while you follow the tunnels that parallel the Western Wall. The video is a short demonstration of how they believe the workers could move such large rocks into place. As we walked through the narrow passageways, we recalled the moving legend that justifies why the Western Wall and these great stones in particular are still relevant today. Legend has it that that poorest of the workers were the ones to build the Western Wall, especially the foundational stones that are buried beneath the ground. Because they could not afford to hire workers to build the walls for them, it was through their toil and love that the wall was built. When the Temple was destroyed, the angels protected the efforts of the poor workers and prevented their stones from being destroyed. Our day was filled with acts of Hesed, from bearing witness to planting trees, giving great honor to the toils of ancestors and seeing their dreams fulfilled.