June 14-15: Hakafa is off to Europe! Here we are at O'Hare, all ready to go.

After a long and uneventful flight, we made it to Prague, even if our luggage did not!

Prague is a beautiful city, full of energy and excitement.

We walked for miles and miles today, taking in the sights and sounds of the presidential palace and its surroundings,

stopping in a cafe for a noontime nosh.

June 16: We spent the day touring Jewish Prague. The Jewish museum of Prague has a vast array of Jewish artifacts from the hundreds of years that Jews lived in towns and villages across the Czech Republic until the Nazis devastated so many communities. The Jewish cemetery in Prague stands as a peaceful testimony to the rich history and culture that permeated the community that once surrounded it.

June 17-19: Our journey to Lostice was momentous. From the moment we arrived and were greeted by the Mayor, we were treated with gracious honor and hospitality.

We walked with our Torah to the synagogue through what was once the Jewish Quarter and were met by more than 150 people anxious to see a relic from Lostice’s Jewish past.

A Christian children’s choir opened the commemoration in the synagogue with a short program of poems and Jewish songs, a stunningly beautiful tribute that left us all in tears.

And, as we chanted from the Torah for the first time in Lostice in more than 60 years, all who were present felt the power of the experience.

Our time in Lostice - visiting the old Jewish cemetery, touring the surrounding area, eating genuine Czech food and Lostice’s famous (SMELLY!) tvarusky cheese - culminated in a special tour of and program at the 13th century Bouzov castle just outside town.

A Moravian trio (all non-Jewish) from Ireland performed a moving program of Jewish music in memory of the Jews of Lostice. We were again in tears, touched by the extent to which the local community went out of its way to welcome us. We will treasure the time we spent there.

On our return to Prague, we stopped in Trebic, a town with a largely unscathed Jewish Quarter now occupied by Gypsies. The highlight was a synagogue, the walls of which were painted with the words of many of the prayers recited on Shabbat.

June 20: Terezin was a disturbing experience. 155,000 Jews passed through this ghetto on the way to Auschwitz; very few survived.

Of the more than 15,000 children to have lived there at one time during the war, only 100 came back. Still, Jewish life existed. Remnants of the art, theater, and music created at Terezin were on display.

We visited a clandestine synagogue nestled in the back of a courtyard.

Terezin stands as a monument to the human need to create, even in the face of the harshest of brutalities.

June 21-22: Off to Budapest!! Our trip to Hungary went smoothly, luggage and all!

We toured much of Budapest, taking in a breathtaking view from the Castle District

and appreciating the proud connection to Magyar history evidenced in Millennium Square.

Our tour of the Jewish Quarter was striking. The Dohany synagogue is Europe’s biggest, the second largest in the world. We were taken by its brightness and its beauty.

Behind the synagogue is a memorial to Raoul Wallenberg and all the other foreign diplomats who rushed to save as many Jews as possible during World War II.

June 23:
Today was a free day. Stan Rosenthal and I went to visit Cigand, the village in which my father was raised.

We saw the family farm and a memorial to local Jews who died in the Holocaust; my father’s mother and sister are named.

We met people who had known my father’s family

and received copies of his report cards from the school that he had attended.

June 24-27:
On Friday, most of our group returned to the United States. Five of us traveled to Minsk to visit the ghetto survivors our congregation supports.

We toured the area of Minsk that used to be the Jewish ghetto and journeyed to Trostenez,

the former location of the 4th largest Nazi death camp.

We spent Friday night at the Reform Jewish synagogue and walked the expansive streets of Minsk’s downtown. We were deeply moved by the people we met and the stories they told.