Reactions ( Final Blog Post )

My reaction to our book are unspeakable, I’m speechless. It’s an ending that I was really happy yet, I was sad. The reason I was sad is because this event actually happened and I wouldn’t of have imagined someone who suffered that much in their life. I liked this book because it sort of gives you you something that it’s twisted and it has a really good and intense description into the details of what happened to the Jews in the Holocaust but, at the same time it gives you a story that you will probably never forget. One of the themes I think can describe this book is hope because they never gave up. They always wanted to make thing better at the camps and the ghettos, pretty much all they wanted to do is survive and with a lot of hope you can out past any obstacle that gets in your way. This is why I think the theme hope encompases the book

I liked this project because of our groups because you get to hear different ideas and reactions to the book. What I learned from this book that never judge or make fun of other people if you don’t know them. What I learned from blogging is that you can speak your mind of what's happening. Blogging is an awesome way let out your reactions to this project. This is project is important for teenagers to be part of because this project open my eyes to a whole new different world and I believe that a project like this can change the world of many others. Thank you!! Everbody for looking at my posts and for commenting. I have learned a lot of things this unit and it’s all because of you. Thank you!! (:

Final thoughts

My reaction to the ending was surprised and happy because of how all the Jews got rescued. It explained very well of how they got rescued and everything that happened. What surprised me was that everyone in her family lived but her dad. It made me think of how are they going to live on without him and they will always have memories of the Holocaust and it will stay with them of all the stuff they did. It brought joy to me when they got rescued because they deserved to live and it must have been hard to live through all that tragic stuff that happened to them. The theme fear is in the book a lot because all the Jews were afraid of what was going to happen to them and if they will make it out alive. In the book elli was afraid of not seeing her brother and if her mother will make it out alive. Everyone showed fear in the novel because the Nazis were very strict about what the Jews did and all the Jews just wanted to be with there family and be free.

I have learned that almost everyone has lost a family member who was in the Holocaust and trying to survive was the hardest thing. I also learned that the Nazis treated the Jews very bad and there were many people starving and getting diseases because of the lack of nutritions.I have learned that many people don't know everything about the Holocaust and that people care about my opinions. This project is important to teenagers because its really fun to see people comment on stuff you write and some of those comments might tell you a fact that you never knew. Thank you  contributors for commenting and complimenting me on my writing.

Final Blog Post

The novel was sad, amazing, and very eye opening. When Elli said she did not want to go to America with her family I was shocked that she didn’t want to start over after what had happened to Elli and her family. I was amazed when Elli said that she did not want to go to America. When she told her mother and brother that she wanted to stay in her home town. I was somewhat shocked as well, I was shocked because she wanted to stay in her home town, and live as she did before. I was also amazed and shocked when Elli decided to go to America, and she had an entirely new outlook on life and I applaud her deeply for that. If I had to choose one theme to represent this whole book it would be choiceless choices. Choiceless choices represent this whole book in many ways whether being a choice for someone or sometimes they became bystanders because of choiceless choices. Because if they didn’t just remain a bystander they could die and if they just remained a bystander the victim would be harmed more. By reading this book I have learned through the eyes and memories of a survivor of what the Holocaust had been like from the conditions to family to death. I have learned that the memories never leave them and that they had an extremely  difficult time and words and actions never leave them. This is an important project for teenagers to be apart of because they will truly understand the life in the Holocaust more than they did by just learning about it. By reading a book from a survivor about their experience in the Holocaust teenagers will feel like they are there with that survivor and feel what is happening and will better understand what happened during this time period. As for the blogging part of this project teenagers will be able to put their own thoughts out there about the Holocaust and have others react and talk to them. This in general was a very great and fun project that I loved  being apart of. Finally thank you so much to every contributor and commentator during this project. You were all very helpful and are very kind to take some time out to read and reply to us. I really appreciate you all for doing that. Thank you once more.

Freedom at Last

“So this is liberation. It’s come.

I am fourteen and I have lived a thousand years.

I’m numb with cold. With hunger. With death and blood, and the rattle of the train rolling on and on.... Freedom at last.” I Have Lived a Thousand Years, p. 205

This quote to me tells me the amount of struggle and pain Elli went through. She is still numb with the thoughts and remembrance of the experience she was in. Reading this quote brings tears of happiness and sadness to my eyes, she is fourteen and throughout the year she was in the ghetto and camps, she feels as though she has lived a thousand years. She has had to grow up so fast and feels she has lived a thousand years. Elli is happy for the freedom but still numb with the thoughts of the camps, the horrific scenes of murder, the unquenchable thirst and the always present hunger. She has been through so much and she is finally finally free.

When I read this quote I think of my family's experiences with foster care. My siblings and I were placed into multiple foster homes and shelters. Our experience wasn’t as traumatizing as Elli and her mothers, but we did have to grow up a lot faster than most people our age did. After we went through the foster care system we were ecstatic for the freedom but still numbed by the experience we went through, such as Elli states. There is  one experience that is more difficult than the others. I was 6 years old and I was separated from my mom, brother, and sister. I was placed in a shelter for children 6 years and older. It doesn’t sound as bad as it really was. The first day I was there, I was told that the shelter was going to be fun and it wasn’t. I was lied to, I had a terrible time there and I was deceived. The leaders were rude and mean, the kids there didn’t let you play with them. I felt alone, nobody to talk to, nobody to comfort me when I am sad. I had no family, no friends, I was surrounded by people but I felt alone. When I finally left I was happy for the freedom, but I can never shake the feeling of longing, I cannot shake the feeling of loss and pain. My experience is minor compared to the victims of the Holocaust but I had to grow up a lot faster than most did, like Elli did.

Survival

“Look, Mommy. I admit, I’m very hungry. And I will eat half of the soup. But you must eat the other half because you have become very thin and every drop of food you deny yourself may prove disastrous”.  I Have Lived a Thousand Years, p. 167

This quote just explains to me how horrible the Holocaust was. They didn't even give you food and if they did it would be nasty or too little. Everyone was really desperate for food in the holocaust that they will eat whatever they gave them because they were really hungry. It just gives me a picture of how awful the Nazis treated the Jews and how strong the Jews are for some of them surviving the holocaust. People changed how they looked because anyone could see there bones of how skinny they are because they had minimal amount of food.

This quote reminds me of the theme choice less choices. The theme choice less choices connects to this quote because you had no choice of eating the meal. If you didn't like it then you would still have to eat it because then you will die of starvation and many people did pass away because of that. If you didn't eat then you will get diseases because of the lack of nutrition. I can also connect this quote to the theme hope and hopelessness because the people who ate the food the Nazis gave them still had hope of them surviving. The people who died of starvation because they didn't eat anything had hopelessness because they gave up. I could connect this quote to the Donner Reed Party because they both had to survive by eating something. Instead of eating regular food the Donner Reed party ate each other which is called cannibalism. The Donner Reed party got diseases to because of the food just like the Jews in the Holocaust. They all had to eat to survive but they were both in a different situation.

Heroes of the Holocaust

Rescuers see themselves as ordinary everyday people because they do not think that what they had done during the time period was extraordinary. They do not think it was extraordinary because in their mind they knew it was the right thing to do. Rescuing for some meant sneaking an extra ration of bread or soup. It could mean someone was friends with someone of a higher ranking and they let them run free during at a transport. A time when help is needed other than rescue is when something little cannot be done as just one person. Rescue was given to the Jews when some people hid them from the Nazis. Some of the ways that people rescued Jewish people was, hiding them in attics, haystacks, and sheds. Another way to rescue them from was any legal documents saying that they were Jewish was to give them new forged identity papers, Raoul Wallenberg did this. There were many different ways to help and rescue the Jewish population, but that didn't mean that there was always the choice or option to do it. The people that did feel that they could rescue some of the Jewish people are considered heroes to me because heroes rescue people and save their lives and that is what those people did. They saved Jewish people's lives and changed them forever. (Information from the article Rescuing Jews)

Heroes

     

                                                           

Think about the terms “help” and rescue.”  What is the difference between these two terms?  In the context of the Holocaust, how do you understand the difference between these two terms?  Can you think of a specific time when help was needed rather than rescue, and of times when Jews needed to be rescued?  Would you characterize those individuals who helped Jews as heroes?  Why or why not?

The difference between those two terms is that when someone helps you they help you because you are in a harm or because you can't do it on your own. Rescue is when you are trapped somewhere you do not want to be and someone comes for you and takes you away from where you are. In the article they said “A Hungarian officer provided water and helped when his Jewish prisoners tired on a long march” (Rescuing Jews reading). They needed help because they were going to dehydrate of how they were walking without drinking water in a hot day. Jews needed to be rescued right when they got in camps or before they went to camps because some were sent straight to the gas chambers and you don't want to see people die for no good reason. People who helped Jews are heroes because they just saved a persons life and isn't that what heroes do. They are really brave for doing that and the people who helped Jews should be recognized.

Scary

       

“Each guard holds on to an arm, and the young girl, screaming, is led out of the barrack. Seconds later, a shot rings out. I sit up with alarm. They shot her?” pg 92, I Have Lived a Thousand Years.

My reaction is how can someone have the heart to kill a girl just because she was screaming! This to me is just so surprising and scary. I wanna know if the Nazis ever felt really bad about shooting innocent people. This just shows me how horrible the Nazis were to the Jews and how strict they were. This is scary because imagine all the Jews that heard that or seen that, they were probably really scared and didn't do anything after that experience.

This quote reminds me of the theme power. The Nazis had a lot of power at that time and they used it all for bad stuff like putting innocent Jews in concentration camps and death camps. This quote reminds me of the Boston Marathon because in the Marathon innocent people died and in this quote a poor little girl died because she was screaming. A little boy in the Boston marathon died because of the explosion. This quote tags along with the marathon because the kids didn't do anything to deserve that devastating problem.

Tears of Hope

“Don’t worry my dear sister.” Mommy puts her arms about her. “ It will be over soon. Soon all this will pass, like a bad dream.” -Mommy pg. #45

My reactions to this quote were all messed up because I was happy but, at the same time I was worried and sad. The reason that I was happy was because they still have hope that it will all end soon that they are trying to live their lives as best as they can and that's what makes me the most happy. The reason that I was sad is because there is two ways to see this that they will survive and have a fresh new start or that they will not survive and that they will have a new beginning in another life.

This quote contains many themes that we are learning some of the themes that this quote has is hope and injustice. The reason I believe that the themes are hope and injustice is because it’s not fair that her aunt goes under depression and that she cries for her freedom. I think that it’s hope because they still believe no matter how bad it gets they will never give up and I think that’s hope. Just the same as the book it also happened in the Holocaust. The way I think it happened in the Holocaust is because I feel that the Jews felt with injustice because since they were different religion they get treated differently.   

http://magazine.uc.edu/issues/0912/rolat.html

In this podcast (hosted on SoundCloud), we discussed the role of the Bystander in our novel.  Check it out!

Week 2 Group Post

When Will the Cruelty End?

“It was then I knew there was no limitation to human cruelty.”

I Have Lived a Thousand Years pg. 115

This quote was amazing to me. It rang with such truth and honesty because the words are true. Nobody knows the limit to human cruelty, and nobody ever will. I’m saddened by the fact that the Jews did not know how far the cruelty would go in the ghettos and concentration camps. The Nazis would starve them, whip them, beat them, humiliate them, make them stand for hours on end, and treat them like they were nothing. The cruelty was slowly getting worse and worse and the people in the ghettos had no idea until they were put into the camps. The conditions of these ghettos camps were cruel. If you lived in a ghetto, you were starved, and humiliated. If you went to a work camp, you were given rotten food every other day, you would have to stand for hours on end waiting for the Nazis to get done calling role. To top all of that off, you were forced to work from dusk till dawn. When you were deported to an extermination camp, you were almost gassed right away. All of these conditions and circumstances are cruel and vicious. The cruelty of the human race is worsening and nobody knows when it will stop.

I can make a personal connection to this quote, I've been bullied a lot in the past two years. Some of the things people would say to me were cruel and full of hate. I didn't think their words could get any worse, but they did. Just like the Holocaust, I was lied to and deceived by the words of others. I was told things couldn't get worse, that people weren't as mean as they seemed. The Jews were constantly lied to, they were told they were just going to find new jobs and work in a happy environment when really it was the complete opposite. This happened to me as well, I was told that my problems with bullies would be resolved and that things could only get better. The severeness and cruelty of the words still hurt me today. The memory of the hatred and bitterness still make my eyes water with pain. I didn't know when it would stop until I realized, it would never stop. This quote also states that human cruelty does not have a limit and it never will. Sometimes you don’t realize it until you go through it personally.

The Unknown Heroes

How would you define resistance?  How did Jews and non-Jews resist Nazi oppression?  What do you think about their actions?

I would define resistance as anybody that doesn't follow orders and does what they feel is right. I think that Jews resisted oppression from the Nazis by planning attacks on them, by keeping any item that may have been of value to them, and keeping journals. Non- Jews resisted by hiding or helping a Jew in any way. I think their actions prove that they are brave, kind hearted people that are willing to do anything for someone they care about. By doing these acts of resistance these people were proving that they weren't afraid to stand up for what they believe in, no matter what the consequence. For example, the Warsaw Ghetto uprising was one of the acts of resistance that stood out to me. The people that were in this resistance just left me in awe and shock. I came across some information that really stood out to me, “During the same year, ghetto inhabitants rose against the Germans in Vilna (Vilnius), Bialystok, and a number of other ghettos. Many ghetto fighters took up arms in the knowledge that the majority of ghetto inhabitants had already been deported to the killing centers; and also in the knowledge that their resistance even now could not save from destruction the remaining Jews who could not fight. But they fought for the sake of Jewish honor and to avenge the slaughter of so many Jews.” After reading this passage I was in shock and awe... These Jewish people stood together and fought for their fallen colleagues, fallen friends, fallen family, and fallen loved ones. There are thousands of acts of resistance and those who were brave enough to actually stand up and fight for what they believe in are the true heroes to me.

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005213 (link to the quoted information)

Social Studies Blog Post 1

In her diary, Anne Frank wrote that she believed “most people are good.”  Do you agree with Anne?  If so, why, and if not, why not?

I disagree because no one is good because everyone has made a really bad mistake in their life that they could of done something to resolve the mistake. The Jews mistake was seeing there own people suffer without them helping them. Like in World War Two some Jews who would watch others suffer consequences that the Nazis gave them and they didn't help each other out by fighting them. However, not all Jews were just bystanders. Some actually fought back. The Nazis were horrible too. They would make the Jews suffer for no good reason just because Hitler told them to. In my opinion the Nazis were followers to Hitler because Hitler didn't like the Jews and then the Nazis didn't like them. All because of Hitler. Everyone has been mean to people just because you are good some days doesn't mean you will always be a good person. You have to be good everyday to be a good person and I don't think anyone today and in the past have always been a good person to everyone. Not even the Jews because they would be very mean to the Nazis because they are being mean to the Jews.

The Price of Freedom

The establishment of ghettos marked the end of freedom of movement for Jews.  Write about what freedom means to you in your life and what you think it would mean to lose it. (Echoes and Reflections)

Freedom could mean many different things to different people. To me freedom means being able to do as you please and the Jews in the ghettos did not have that privilege. The Jews rights were slowly getting stolen from them. Their freedom was getting taken from them at small amounts at a time then they were deported to ghettos. After being deported to the ghettos they had almosts no rights at all. After a long period of time it got to the point where the Jews were not allowed to see anybody, talk to anybody, and their freedom was gone completely. If I lost my freedom like the Jewish people had I would be horrified and saddened. To lose my freedom would mean that my rights were gone and I would feel like less of a human because of that. The Jews were dehumanized and put into ghettos, they lost all of their rights and freedom. Freedom is important and a lot of us can’t imagine living in a world without it. After the Jews were put into ghettos, they were willing to take any sign of freedom because the luxury of it was suddenly taken away from them.

Angered, But Helpless of Fear

“In my panic and rage I felt helpless, exposed, violated.” - I Have Lived A Thousand Years, p. 24

This quote almost made me cry because of the reason that she didn't want to give up and she wanted to her bike that her parents gave her for her birthday. It also made me angry to think that many kids had to suffer in the Holocaust, that they had to give up their favorite things as kids and many never even knew what was happening until they saw the killings and it does get me mad. It’s sad knowing that many kids wanted to be brave and stand up but I think they were too scared because of the reason they were small. I really wish this Holocaust had never happened but you can’t change what the Nazis and what Hitler did to the innocent Jewish families.

The small connection I can make with this quote is about when I recently moved.  When I moved, there was fire in my house. We had to leave pretty much all of our belongings. I was really sad because I knew that some things that I had since I was really little that I loved, I wasn’t going to see them again, so when the book said that they were forced to leave their stuff it reminded me of the bad situation that my family and I were in. This was choiceless choices because the Jews pretty much had no choices at all it was a choice of life or death. In my situation we also pretty much had no choices at all we had to move and begin our lives all over again.

Jewish family in ghetto liquidation (feeling helpless)

http://collections.yadvashem.org/photosarchive/en-us/37379.html

Helplessly Reassuring

“We are lost and helpless. Like lifeless matter we are carried along on a powerful conveyor belt toward an unknown fate. The smooth operation of the process is strangely reassuring.”    I Have Lived a Thousand Years, p. 25

Being in this situation must have been difficult and discouraging. It really puts the Jewish people’s experiences into perspective because some of them felt that they were lifeless matter heading to an unknown fate. I just cannot wrap my mind around how Elli was feeling. This quote amazed me, angered me, and taught me new things because it shows me how helpless and unsure the Jews were and how they were forced to give up some of the things they loved. They had to give up some of their most prized possessions. They had to give up their homes, their pets, their jewelry. I cannot imagine the pain and hopelessness they were experiencing. The impact this quote actually had on me was amazing. It dazed me and taught me new things about what the victims of the Holocaust felt. The targeted people had no idea as to what was going on and they took any sign of hope, even if it was false hope and  they absorbed it, transformed from it. They took this false hope and made it comforting  and reassuring.

When this I read this quote I think of the theme victim. I think of victim because the Jews were victims of the Nazis and their acts of hatred. The Jews were victims because they were forced to give up their possessions and homes for the use of the Nazis. My connection to this quote is, “You cannot continue to victimize someone else just because you yourself were a victim once—there has to be a limit.” I connect these two quotes to the theme victim because if you have once been a victim you should not victimize others because of it. Hitler victimized the Jews in many ways. He victimized them by taking away their rights, then he deported them to ghettos, and then he transported them to work camps, and death camps. The Holocaust was a major event in our history that was built because of victimization.

Student Name: Gotti

• Bio: Hi, my name is Gotti. I like reading books and drawing. My favorite color is blue, I love watching college sports with my family, and I’m very open minded about everyone and everything.
• Previous Knowledge/Opinions Prior to the Project: I know that they Holocaust was a very hard and tragic time for the Jewish, Homosexuals, Catholic, “Gypsies”, and elderly people. The mainly targeted group was the Jewish and they were segregated and put into ghettos and concentration camps. 11 million civilians were killed and 6 million of which were Jews.
• Thoughts About the Project on Day 1: Day 1 was fun. The book I chose I Have Lived a Thousand Years seems very interesting and intense. I’m very excited about this entire unit, I feel the blogging is going to be fun and I cannot wait to see everybodys comments and responses.

Joselyne's Bio

Student Name: Joselyne

• Bio: My name is Joselyne I am a great fan of soccer and football. My favorite colors are hot pink and baby blue. I am open minded, creative and very competitive.
• Previous Knowledge/Opinions Prior to the Project: All I know about the Holocaust is that it was really rough for the Jews, Gypsies, homosexual,Catholic, Polish, and the mentally and physically ill. It was a time where they took their rights and privacy. The Nazis would physically and mentally harm them.
• Thoughts About the Project on Day 1: The first day was great. I thought at first this was gonna be boring and difficult but, it turn out to be fun and easy.