Teacher blog

Let's travel to Europe....

Driving into Bosnia

As I type this we are driving into Bosnia. We are actually in Republica Srbskia, a breakaway part of Bosnia Herzgovinia that is Serbian majority. We are basically driving through a war zone. The change was immediate when we came through the border. Croatia is not a wealthy country but the difference was still obvious in both the state of homes and the materials. It reminds me a great deal of my visit to the Soviet Union in 1988. This area was ethnically cleansed of all its Muslim and Catholic inhabitants during the war in the 1990's.

Slideshow Images

Summer Academy Vienna

My three or so days in Vienna have flown by in a haze of jet lag, lack of sleep and constant stimulation and activity. Our first day began around lunch time - or what would have been 3 am in Seattle - on what felt like one extended day that began about 23 hours before when I woke up at 4 am in Seattle. The flight over had been good and an opportunity to get to know three of the other teachers in my program. We were all on the same flight and had arranged to meet up at Dulles Airport.

Sarajevo Academy 2014

Slideshow Images

Nicholas Winton in Liverpool Station

In London, we decided to find where Nicholas Winton's children had ended up - at Liverpool Station. There we found a monument, not only to his children but to the entire Kindertransport project. This became even more poignant when we were blessed to meet a survivor of that effort - courtesy of Centropa - in Vienna.

Slideshow Images

Kathe Kollwitz Part 2

Last summer on the way to Centropa we came across Kathe Kollwitz's rooms near Moritzburg, where she died. We saw some of her works there, and in Berlin her magnificent sculpture. It was a delightful surprise to come across this 1923 work, "The War againat War!" in the MAK in Vienna with Centropa.

Slideshow Images

first impressions of Sarajevo

Yesterday we (Erwin Dorn and me) arrived in Sarajevo by plane. We visited some places closely connected to the assassination of the archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie Chotek.

Finally we saw the touching exhibition of photographs dealing with "Sebrenica" and the siege of Sarajevo (see attached photos).

Today we will be glad to meet you!!! :-)

Waltraud/ Erwin

Slideshow Images

Vienna-Zagreb

We had another full day, though a large part of today was spent on the road. I highly admire the driving and parking skills of our bus driver. If only I know how to park my Suzuki Splash the way he parked our behemoth bus + trailer in front of our Vienna hotel.

Slideshow Images

Day Three

Yesterday was a very productive and enjoyable day. The Leo Luster fllm, the lecture by Hannah Lessing, and the presentation on ephimeral films were all inspiring. I will try to bring Mr Luster to our school, and I am thinking about having some of my students work with the website of the Ephimeral Film Project: National Socialism in Austria. I very much enjoyed the shabbat service, which was quite different from what I am used to in Israel.

Here and There

Please allow me (and maybe all of the Israeli participants, but I can only speak for myself) to apologize for having been and continuing to be a little bit preoccupied every now and then in the last couple of days. While we are here a war is going on in Israel and Gaza. My family and I live near Haifa, in the north of the country. In 2006, during the Second Lebanon War, my wife was pregnant with our third child, and after a week we fled to Holland, where we stayed for five weeks. I constantly (wherever and whenever there is WIFI, that is) receive updates from home and follow the news.