I had been watching the white, curved building rise on Meridian Avenue, waiting for the day it would finally open.

When it did, I found myself standing at a podium in Theater II, microphone in hand, speaking to 101-year-old Jack Waksal. On the screen, he wore a light blue collared shirt and a navy zip-up sweater. In real life, he was sitting in the next room, in his pink checkered button-down.

It happened during the opening of the new Education Center at the Holocaust Memorial Miami Beach.

I spent much of the day giving demonstrations of “Dimensions in Testimony.” Visitors could ask questions and hear responses from Holocaust survivors through interactive technology.

On the screen was Jack Waksal. He is someone I know well. Over time, he has come to feel more like an adopted grandfather than just a fellow volunteer.

What made that moment surreal was that Jack was physically there that day, sitting just a few steps away in the classroom next door.

I found myself speaking to his image on the screen, asking questions, listening to his answers, and clarifying what he was saying for the audience, while knowing he was right there, just beyond the wall.

Usually, I do this standing next to him.

When he tells the story of being sixteen, of wrestling a gun out of a Nazi’s hand as he was about to be shot into a mass grave, of falling in and climbing out and running into the forest, I slow it down. I repeat it. I make sure people understand what they just heard.

He also tells another story. As a teenager in a labor camp, he convinced a non-Jewish worker to give him wire cutters. He memorized the guards’ shift changes. He planned his escape and helped sixteen other Jews escape with him.

Now I was doing that with his image.

And I could see it happen. I would repeat part of his story so it was clear, and then I would watch people’s faces change. You could see when they understood. Their expressions shifted. Sometimes their jaws dropped.

The stories are still alive.

Not just because they are remembered, but because they are still being told, still being heard, and still being understood in new ways.

Later, I walked through the exhibition hall where a photo installation lines the space.

There is a section where my grandmother’s photo appears.

In the section about life after liberation, there is a photo of Jack, Sabina, and their son Sam. Right below it is a photo of my grandmother, Rose.

Sabina and Rose are there together again.

They had known each other long before I was born. They were in Auschwitz-Birkenau together. They were in Bergen-Belsen together. They worked in the kitchen together in Elsnig. They were on the same train that was bombed by the Americans on Hitler’s birthday.

I still remember when Jack told me he had known my grandparents, and that his wife had been with my grandmother.

I stood there looking at their photos for a while.

During the opening, Sheri Zvi, Matan Ben-Aviv, and Jessica Katz each spoke about being grandchildren of survivors. They spoke about their families, about those who are no longer here, and about what it means to carry those stories forward.

It did not feel like a formal program. It felt shared.

The memorial itself, designed by artist and architect Kenneth Treister, has always been a place of memory. The new Education Center adds something more. It creates space for interaction, for questions, and for moments that are not scripted.

As a docent, I often think about what people take with them when they leave.

Not facts. Not dates. Something that stays with them.

I do not expect Holocaust education to make hatred disappear. People will sometimes choose hate no matter what.

But I hope it can bring people into contact with a human story.

I hope this place creates a moment where someone sees another person not as history, but as a life.

Standing in that room, speaking with Jack on the screen while he sat just beyond the wall, and later walking through the exhibit and seeing how these lives continue to be connected, I felt that clearly.

This space does not feel like history to me.

It feels like extended family.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)