“The world is a dangerous place to live, not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don’t do anything about it.”
—Albert Einstein
Like me, my words are fragile. How can I pass on my memories without making them trite, weighing them down, or overwhelming the other person?
I realize that it would be destructive to imprison a new generation in a memory that was nothing but painful.
The question I wrestle with is: How can I use words to pass on what cannot be communicated, in such a way that provokes in everyone an appeal to responsibility and to life?
To do so, I chose a teaching method when I was asked by some history teachers to talk about my experience of deportation in high schools and middle schools. I developed a preliminary questionnaire aimed at the students. With a group of about ten of them, we pick apart the responses without knowing who wrote them. That helps me to adjust my questions and answers when I find myself standing in front of a large number of young people (between one hundred and fifty and three hundred).
In general they are scared to ask questions. Does that not come from us adults, who do not know how to ask them questions, or take their interests as a starting point? What is important to me is to get them asking themselves questions. It is only by starting with their questions that I can call them toward their own life. Their questions speak volumes about what they are experiencing today.
I sense that they are receptive and active. The questionnaire helps them to articulate their prejudices, their fears, the things they do not know, the things they hate. Some manage to say, “I don’t know.” I congratulate them on their courage, and I explain that whoever can say “I don’t know” is the on the road to knowledge. Knowing things is important, but if this is only in the head, then for me it is empty of meaning. Knowledge has an ethical dimension. It is simple to pass things on.
This is the message that I leave as a kind of pointer at the end of my presentations:
In sharing my story with you, all I want is that you find confidence in yourselves, that you are able to commit as free agents.
Stay true to yourselves. Do not abandon yourselves, thinking that you are responding to other people’s expectations of you, or through fear that you will be less liked.
I invite you to stand firm against outside influences, and to choose your own sources of information. Do not swallow everything they tell you is true. When you are witness to situations that you feel are unacceptable, humanly unfair, trust yourselves. Discern, choose, and be responsible for your choices. Transform indifference and ignorance into solidarity. For me, indifference and ignorance are the death of humanity.
To forgive is to change the way you look at yourself and at others.
Now it is up to you to imagine, to work together, to cultivate real connections with less fear, so as to rediscover hope in our humanity, and to be vigilant witnesses, today, where you are.
You are the builder of your own life, and you are responsible for what you become.”
After our meeting another questionnaire is distributed by the teachers, who then take over the task of helping the young people talk about their family memories, the story of their lives, and history.
Without their own story, history has no meaning for them.
I am amazed by the treasure they carry within them. How do we take this immense wealth that is often waiting to be uncovered and make it spring up, so they can give it in their own way to the world of tomorrow?
I am moved by the infinite beauty of the color and the light in their eyes. Should we not look differently at ourselves and at them?
Within us we have the freshness and the beauty of spring.