Committee for Children Blog

A Perspective from Dachau

Today's blog entry is written by Client Outreach Representative Michael Moretsky.

Michael MoretskyI love my job for many reasons. I get to travel the country and meet with schools that use Committee for Children programs or want to know more about social-emotional learning. I’ve had a number of eye opening and enlightening experiences on my travels. But sometimes, at the end of a trip, I’m tired and just want to shut my eyes. And sleep. All the way home on those long, nighttime, cross-country flights.

On one such flight a couple years ago, I was ready to do just that. I was attempting to get as comfortable as possible in row 28 of a 757 when a man I estimated to be in his 70s or early 80s stopped at my row, pointed to the empty seat next to me, and smiled. I got up for him, and as he passed by me to sit, he thanked me in a European accent. I debated whether or not I was up for conversation or just wanted to read a couple pages of Skymall and sleep, but I felt I had a little energy left.

So I asked him where he was from. Germany. And as we jetted back home to Seattle we continued to have a typical on-an-airplane conversation. He asked me what I do and I told him about Committee for Children, and the Second Step program and what it entails. When I mentioned that it involves perspective taking, he told me, “Well, then. Have I got a perspective-taking story for you!” and he told me a story about perspective (and more) that I will never forget.

He told me that he is a concentration camp survivor. He had been in Dachau for a little over a year when the war ended. He had been unable to get any information about what was going on in the outside world. So when he saw Japanese servicemen heading toward the encampment, he and his fellow captives assumed that Japan had decided to invade Germany. Only when the troops approached closer did the man now sitting next to me see the American flags on their uniforms and realize that he was being liberated. By an American. He went on to point out that these very same soldiers’ relatives back in the states were also being confined to camps. Yet here they were in Europe, doing what they wished they could also do back at home.

This was a profound lesson to me in world and American history, perspective taking, empathy, and forgiveness. It was also a lesson that everyone, including the stranger sitting next to me on an airplane, has an amazing story to tell.