“Taking a Hammer at the Wall of Silence – How an English Teacher from Hungary Became the Education Coordinator at the Adelaide Holocaust Museum”
It was the afternoon of the 9th November 2020 when my daughter and I hesitantly entered the newly opened Adelaide Holocaust Museum. A short elderly man was leaving the building with some dignitaries. I excitedly whispered to my daughter: “That’s Andrew Steiner. I wonder if he still speaks Hungarian.”
I had just finished my studies at UniSA (Because immigrants’ qualifications are still sus in Australia….) and entered the less than glamorous life of relief teachers’ day to day fighting with hundreds of other teachers for the privilege of being ignored by other teachers and students. One day after another inspiring day of keeping my wards alive, my wife greets me with a smile on her face announcing: “They’ve just advertised the job of your dreams: Education Coordinator at the newly opened Adelaide Holocaust Museum and Andrew Steiner Education Centre.” “Oh, they would not have a strange Hungarian with a weird accent,” I thought with my usual sense of confidence. I did end up applying, and in June 2021 I took the position that has since then filled every day with purpose, pride and enthusiasm.
Sharing the stories of the Holocaust with young people in South Australia, getting to know people and their stories, meeting members of this wonderfully diverse and proud community has been an amazing experience. Since the beginning of the redevelopment of the museum, we have been offered a unique opportunity to spend time in living Jewish spaces in Adelaide, first at AHC and currently at Beit Shalom. I will cherish these interactions and my admiration for this community could not be greater
Why is this so important for me? I come from a family of Hungarian Holocaust survivors and Germans with dubious histories. What has characterised the family from all sides was the impenetrable wall of silence. Shame, guilt, pain, and a duty to protect the young sealed their lips. And this silence poisoned their lives.
At the age of 18 the carnage of these untold stories was revealed to me in all its ugliness. It made me angry for a long time and I blamed them for denying me the knowledge they all took to their graves. When I share the stories of the brave who understood that telling these stories is the only way we can honour the dead and follow the moral principle of Tikkun Olam. I have to admit that it still hurts that I never got to hear their stories, and I can’t pass them on to my children. Their stories died with them. But this cannot happen to all the stories.
I’m enormously grateful for the people who found the strength to share what happened to them in those dark times of hatred, destruction, blind obedience to power and propaganda to help us build a better, kinder, more compassionate world for future generations.
Being a part of this process is the most gratifying and rewarding experience, and my small way to honour the memory of those who are gone but never forgotten. Chipping away at the wall of silence one session, one student at a time is a powerful gift we can give to young people. If they know our stories there is a hope they will never repeat our histories.
Oh yes, and Andrew’s Hungarian is better than mine. It is our special treat when we can talk in our cherished, shared language.