A Glimpse at Why I joined the Team...

Sorry this took so long to put together T... there is more, but this is a part of why.... Thanks for letting me share.

Four years ago this week I stood in a damp barn like structure. Fenced off in front of me were thousands upon thousands of shoes, representing the lives abruptly taken by the Nazi party. I can still remember the thick leather smell, and see the dark blues, blacks and brown shoes that lay in front of me, toppling over one another. I had seen an exhibit similar to this at the Holocaust Museum in Washington DC a month previous, but this was the real thing. These shoes were not dusted. This was not an exhibit. This was Madjanek, one of several extermination camps.

The other forty six students walked slowly in and out of these barn like structures, trying to understand how anything like this could happen in history. Some of my fellow classmates held each others hands, in comfort; but there was no comfort here. Sixty one years later, the same evil cold was cast over the camp, and there was no peace.

I stayed for a long time in this cabin. Among the thousands of shoes, one caught my eye. It was crippling. A beautiful red high heal shoe. A red dress shoe. Still, four years later the image is burned into my mind, and I try to imagine what this woman might have been doing the day the Nazis came for her.

Was she sitting on the wrong bench? Was she on a date with her boyfriend or husband? Was she enjoying a night out dancing, when she was noticed without her star of David patched on her dress? I can not believe that this woman believed that she was walking to her death in these exquisite red shoes, that sixty one years after liberation still stood bright against all the other shoes.

It was this shoe that made the Holocaust so much more real to me. Behind every shoe in front of me, there was a story. There was a friend, a mother, a father, a sister, aunt, uncle, brother. These shoes walked miles in the cold. These shoes walked into a gas chamber, and never walked again. These shoes were salvaged, but the people who stood in them were not.

At that moment, in front of the pit of shoes I made a promise to myself. A promise that at each concentration camp that I visited for those ten days, I seemed to restate in my mind. I promised that I would work toward never allowing such an atrocity like this to happen again. I would get my education. I would work toward social change, and social justice.

When I came to PC, I buried myself in work. I majored in Social Work in hopes of helping the underprivileged and undeserved. In high school, I posted the picture of the red shoe on my door, and every morning when I left my room, I was reminded of my mission. To be completely honest, int he past two years, I feel that I have drifted off my path. My studies overwhelmed me, and I did not remain globally conscious. When I heard about the opportunity to join this group, in planning a week about genocide awareness, I knew it would be a challenge for myself. I joined for the purpose of educating myself, along with my peers. I am happy to say that the members of xthirty6 have taught me so much; not only about the world, but about myself and my limits. They have encouraged me to push myself, and demanded more of me. They have inspired me by proving that there truly are people on this campus, and in this world that have the will to change, and the talent to do so.

So thank you Xthirty6 for letting me join your team, and here's to mastering peace! I hope that our hard work and determination will reach the student body and beyond. But please know before we start this week, even if we have zero attendance at any of our events, you have reached me.