SEE YOU NEXT YEAR IN JERUSALEM ZBĄSZYŃ-JERUSALEM 2008
 
 
On 28 October 2008, in Zbąszyń, we began realisation of the concept of erecting the SUITCASE EFFIGY on platform I of the railway station. We are currently looking for ambassadors of our project  (its description is presented below).
 
If you would like to support this idea, send your email to: walizka@tres.org.pl.
Your opinion will be made public.
 
 
 
 
 
picture from Kurier Poznański, 1938
 
SOMETIMES A SUITCASE DOES NOT SIGNIFY A JOURNEY Sometimes it is all you have got, all they let you take, when they came in the morning and evicted you for your home. Can a single suitcase contain your identity, the history of your life, your dignity? How many times has the unspeakable evil begun its wrongdoings by removing people from their homes? How many times has it started with a single suitcase kept in a refuge’s hand? One of the most important lessons history can teach us is showing us how to recognise the recurring cycles, and when those cycles bring suffering – showing us how to oppose them. In October 1938 about 17,000 Jews, holders of Polish passports, were evicted from Germany to Poland. 9000 of them were sent to Zbąszyń by force. Through the mouths of their officials, the Polish authorities refused to give them help. The inhabitants of Zbąszyń proved to be less vulnerable to the vile racist propaganda. They were sympathetic towards the refugees and offered them shelter. The evicted lived among them in Zbąszyń for nearly 10 months. They were leaving from the local railway station hoping for a better fate and the end of their journey. Let’s bear in mind that this place – the platform of a railway station – became a symbolic stage in the tragedy of thousands of Jews, and that the Zbąszyń people did not deny their right to dignity, identity and hope. Let’s remember that they headed for the unknown and the suitcases they were carrying were not symbols of a common journey. Zbąszyń 28 October 1938 28 October 2008
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