Last week was Purim, and everyone gathered in their costumes to read the Megillah in the Beit Knesset. Afterward, we joined an exciting party with students from Muss, Milken High School, and CESJDS. The theme was Disney, and everyone did a great job matching their costumes to it. My friends and I dressed up as Hercules. The party had booths with activities, candy, dancing, and lots of food. The food in Israel is always delicious, and at the party, we had a smoothie station, a schnitzel station, and a barbecue station. 

The next day, we had the chance to sleep in and ease into a relaxing open Shabbat. Some students stayed on campus, while others visited family and friends. 

On Sunday, we visited Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem, where we heard from a Holocaust survivor named Shoshana. She shared her incredible story of being hidden in a coffee shop in France for a year, escaping to Switzerland, and being separated from her parents in a refugee camp—and her miraculous reunion with them after the war ended. 

Once we returned to campus, we went to bed early, knowing we had to wake up at 12:30 a.m. to head to Ben-Gurion Airport. It was finally time for our long-awaited trip to Poland! We arrived in Warsaw early in the morning and immediately got on the bus to begin our journey. Our first stop was the Judaic Historical Institute, where we learned about record-keeping as an act of resistance against the Nazis in the Warsaw Ghetto. Then, we visited the Great Warsaw Cemetery, where we heard the stories of several well-known Jews buried there. 

That night, we drove to Bialystok. The next day, we traveled to the town of Jedwabne, where we learned about a horrific act of Polish antisemitism during the Holocaust and visited the memorial commemorating the town’s Jewish community, which was wiped out by their own Polish neighbors. Afterward, we visited a beautiful synagogue in Tykocin, a once-thriving Jewish community. The synagogue, one of the tallest buildings in the small town, was filled with Hebrew inscriptions and vibrant artwork. 

Lastly, we visited the site where the Jews of Tykocin were murdered in the forest. Together, we sang HaTikvah, capturing the unbreakable spirit of the Jewish people. 

This was a jam-packed week at Muss—I hope you enjoyed this glimpse into our semester! 

Josh is 16 years old and a sophomore at Deerfield High School in Deerfield, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago.