Education

Student Essay: "Never Forget."

By Sienna Audrey.

Shocked, emotional, connected. These are the three words I used to describe my reaction to the Holocaust Museum located in Washington D.C. Over the course of our amazing school trip, we were given the opportunity to see a handful of memorials, museums, and historical sites. Although I thoroughly enjoyed each one of them, my personal favorite was the museum which was dedicated to the horrific event during World War 2 called the Holocaust.  The Holocaust was an attempted mass genocide of the Jews by the Nazis from 1941 to 1945.

Shocked. Before entering the museum, we rode an elevator. The dark blue lighting inside set the mood for the wave of shock I would feel once in the exhibit. As I walked through the exhibit, it was easy to follow the timeline and see all the atrocities which occurred. I was in complete shock to see how poorly Jewish people were treated. for example, they were beaten, starved, tortured, experimented on, stripped of their possessions, separated from their families, and murdered.

Emotional. As I took short breaks in between each exhibit, I felt tears forming in my eyes. I didn’t understand how anyone could treat people like that. In one part of the museum, I watched a video of the bodies of the Jews being thrown into a ditch to be burned. I saw how their bodies were starved and emaciated, it made me sick to my stomach. In order to make me understand better how they were treated, I tried to put myself in their situation. Wondering what it would be like to be a Jew, living a normal life, to one day being stripped of all my most prized possessions. Separated from my loved ones only in the hopes that maybe I would see them tomorrow. Being overworked and starved every day bearing just to make it through the week wondering if or when it would end. Some of the Jews didn’t want to make it and instead took their own lives. In life everyone wants to fit in, find a place they feel like they belong. For a Jew, they didn’t feel like they had a place. They were said to be “the bad luck” and the “source of everyone’s problem” and I thought of how in my life I want to fit in, and how hard it would be for me or for anyone to feel the same mistreatment they did. Not to mention there were kids my age and my brother’s age during this time that were going through this. This really made me emotional imagining what happened to the families like mine. It made my heart sink to the bottom of my stomach.  No one deserves what they went through.

Connected. This is not the first time I have heard about the Holocaust. I started studying it halfway through 7^th grade in my English class. I have read and watched several movies on this topic. Although I definitely do not know everything about the Holocaust. I knew enough for me to understand most of the information in the museum. I was born and raised in the country Germany where most of this began and took place. While living there I had no idea this happened or that it even existed. When I moved to America and started learning about it in school and hearing the things that the Nazis did, it made me feel almost feel guilty. At the same time, it made me feel connected living in the same country that was at the center of the war. One of the exhibits I especially connected with was the real cattle car that you were able to walk through and see inside of. It was used for transportation of the Jews, in unsanitary conditions. Or even the small things like the propaganda which was in German. I understood almost every word. As I walked through one of the catwalks connecting the building, I read all the names on the windows of the cities in Germany and other places that were taken over and ruled by the Nazis knowing I have been to quite a few of the places on the list.  This museum really made me realize I was surrounded by the Holocaust a whole lot more than I thought.

 Shocked, emotional, connected.  The Holocaust Museum was an unforgettable experience. it brought up a lot of emotions, but I learned a lot and want to continue learning about it as much as I can to fully understand what happened and to make sure it’s never forgotten, and never happens again. Overall, this Washington DC trip was a new and an interesting experience and definitely taught me a whole lot of lessons. Personally, I love traveling and seeing new things, so this trip was new and enjoyable for me.