{"id":15972,"date":"2015-10-03T23:16:25","date_gmt":"2015-10-04T06:16:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.msia.org\/newdayherald\/?p=15972"},"modified":"2015-10-03T23:16:25","modified_gmt":"2015-10-04T06:16:25","slug":"j-r-legacy-tour-part-3-day-1-escape-from-the-concentration-camp-but-still-in-hu-rope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.msia.org\/newdayherald\/archives\/15972-j-r-legacy-tour-part-3-day-1-escape-from-the-concentration-camp-but-still-in-hu-rope","title":{"rendered":"J-R Legacy Tour Part 3, Day 1: Escape from the Concentration Camp, but Still in Hu-rope"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The first full day of Part 3 of the J-R Legacy Tour. We’ve gone from about 80 people for the PAT 8 to the last 40 or so diehards for the third part. Only the ultra-rich are left now. (That’s a joke, people, and like all jokes it’s just a selected portion\u00a0of the truth. Actually you should listen to some people’s stories about how money for these trips has manifested for them over the years.)\u00a0We hit the small village of St. Jean Pied de Port, and we hit it hard, filling the narrow streets as we always do. They’re ready for us though, because the village is a major stop on the famous pilgrimage route called the Camino de Santiago de Compostela. More quaint cobblestone streets, more picturesque ruins, more caf\u00e9s, more shops where the savvy pilgrim\u00a0can buy anything she needs for her pilgrimage.<\/p>\n

John does a blessing in a church and we say goodbye to Marcos who’s returning to Spain. Then the day gets really gloomy and rainy, perfect weather for a visit to a concentration camp. The Gurs camp is now a cornfield and forest, with some memorials, reconstructed barracks and remnants of railroad tracks to show what it was like. (I\u00a0have always known that my grandmother was in a concentration camp for a while but wasn’t sure which one. When I call my dad that evening I find\u00a0out that it was actually Gurs. She was\u00a0the only one of my Jewish family who\u00a0got caught as they were fleeing from Germany through France. My mother, who would have been around 19, and my aunt and uncle, managed to avoid being captured. Luckily the Vichy government was letting some people emigrate at the time, and my grandmother got out just a couple of weeks before everyone in the camp was sent to Auschwitz where they were all killed.) There’s a solemnity in our\u00a0group, we’re wet and cold, and John does another light column and short talk, and gets us to sing a bit to clear the air: “What the World Needs Now.”<\/p>\n

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