The Cape Town Holocaust & Genocide Centre (CTHGC) has organised a tour to Poland, which kicks off this week. Called ‘Echoes of (post) memory: A journey through Jewish Poland’, the tour will tackle many of the uncomfortable and tragic elements of Polish Jewish history, while also looking at various Polish-Jewish issues in the contemporary Polish world. The Cape Jewish Chronicle will bring you news about the tour via our various channels.
Tour participants speak about what they hope to achieve on the tour and what motivated them to join the tour.
Cape Town’s Jos Hurwitz is travelling to Poland with her brother, Saul Gorin, who also lives here. Jos recently retired from many years in the education field, and has begun a new chapter in her life as a volunteer guide at the (CTHGC). Jos explains the importance of her participation in the CTHGC tour to Poland during late July 2025.
This journey is not only an educational opportunity – it is also a deeply personal one.
My father, Rachmiel Gorin (originally ‘Chweigon’), was born in Vilna (when it still fell under Poland) and came to Cape Town at the age of six with his mother Bassel (my Bobba Bassel) and four siblings. My grandfather Israel had already spent nine years working as a tailor in Claremont, saving to bring his family out of an increasingly precarious Europe. His foresight likely saved their lives.
Though my father seldom spoke of his childhood in Poland, he remained closely connected to the culture, food, and strong family values of the town called Ignalina and of Vilna. My brother Saul and I have chosen to take part in this tour to honour his memory, to walk the paths of our ancestors, and to deepen our understanding of where we come from.
This journey is both personal and communal. It is about honouring those who came before us – and ensuring that the stories, values, and lessons they carried are passed on with care and conviction. Holocaust education is more important than ever. It calls on us to remember, to bear witness, and to educate future generations with courage and compassion.
Capetonian Veronica Belling says, “My interest is historical and literary rather than family-orientated.
As a Jewish Studies librarian, researcher and teacher, I am passionate about Jewish languages – both Hebrew and Yiddish. My own family, like most South African Jews, came from Lithuania, just after the Boer War, in 1903. I have visited Lithuania twice. On the other hand with 3 million Jews in Poland – versus 220,000 in Lithuania – Poland was the heartland of Jewry – and Vilna, the capital of Lithuania, was once part of Poland! Moreover this tour is organised by the Cape Town Holocaust & Genocide Centre whose Director, Jakub Nowakowski, is himself a Pole. This is a first and I wanted to be a part of it!”
Why I am travelling to Poland (participant prefers not to be named)
I have never previously considered going there, however after meeting Kuba earlier this year in Cape Town, and hearing that he was arranging this trip, I felt confident that it would be a highly informative and sensitively managed week. I hope that it will allow me to try and and come to terms with the sorrow I feel as an older adult, regarding the severe losses to my parents’ and grandparents’ generation during the war. I don’t know the exact number of my Dutch and German relatives who perished at Auschwitz. I do know that it is more than 80 – and that’s on the Dutch side of the family – with the surnames Schuitevoerder and Kopuit. On the Spiegel and Frank side I am only recently trying to establish how many perished, as my late father did not speak about it enough for us to know. Hence I recently know, through a German researcher, of one relative on my Dad’s side who died at Auschwitz and there will undoubtedly be more, since my Grandfather was one of 13 siblings, (their families yet to be traced).
Also read: Interwoven threads: Polish and Jewish culture
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