March of the Living

Featured image copyright: March of the Living/Blake Ezra

Our Chief Executive, Olivia Marks-Woldman; Head of Communications, Emma Doggart and two our Next Gen Ambassadors, Megan and Libi joined this year’s March of the Living, travelling to Kraków and Warsaw in Poland.   

The five-day programme took participants to vibrant Jewish communities before the war and the devastation that followed. From synagogues and towns where these communities once flourished to their destruction, including two of the largest extermination camps, Auschwitz-Birkenau and Treblinka. Sincere thanks to colleagues at March of the Living UK for a superbly organised and well-led programme.  

Olivia said: 

Each time I visit Auschwitz, or stand by mass graves in a forest, I learn new aspects of this horrific history. And participating for the first time in the March itself felt extraordinary – joining 7,000 people from around the world who were walking in memorial to the 6 million Jewish people who were murdered in the Holocaust, in honour of, and with, so many survivors, and in celebration of Jewish life today. I found it profoundly moving to hear the shofar announce the start of the March – the shofar (ram’s horn) is the foundational sound of Jewish existence and to hear it in the grounds of Auschwitz was deeply poignant.

 

Emma said:

“Walking through once vibrant Jewish communities, standing in the remains of the ghettos and visiting Auschwitz-Birkenau and Treblinka – the largest Nazi concentration camps – brought into sharp focus the scale of systematic murder, carried out with chilling efficiency, deception and dehumanisation. The March of the Living itself was so powerful. Knowing that, towards the end of the war, prisoners were forced on death marches and then thousands of people walking that ground today, in life and in remembrance.  Together, we learned, we remembered and we connected – making new friendships and taking on the responsibility to carry these lessons forward.”

 

Megan said:

Being part of March of the Living as an HMDT Next Gen Ambassador is an experience I deeply value. It provided a space where we could express ourselves openly, embrace our authentic identities and communicate freely without fear of judgement, while also listening to one another with genuine respect and understanding.

 

Libi added:

“We were encouraged to question and explore. Led by survivors, educators and our bus leader, we commemorated the lives lived and those lost with dignity and respect.”

 

Find out more about March of the Living.