Family Supplement: Students' Pages
Holocaust Education At Concordia International School Shanghai
On 24 February, 2014, Concordia International School Shanghai welcomed Holocaust survivor, Peter Feigl, as he shared the story of his rescue by the villagers of Le Chambon; a small village in France. On the heals of his visit, Alexandra Zapruder, author of Salvaged Diaries, a compilation of young writer’s diaries from the Holocaust, visited Concordia in conjunction with the Shanghai International Literary Festival. Aside from middle school and high school students, Peter Feigl and Alexandra Zapruder shared their stories with the community as a part of Concordia Presents speaker series. What follows is a student's reflection on hearing first-hand from the incredible story of Peter Feigl.
A Light in the Darkness
Alight in the darkness; what does this mean? Through the week Peter Feigl, a child holocaust survivor, shared his story, experiences and hardships during the Holocaust. By the end of his testimony, it was evident that each one of us must play a role and be a light in the darkness. Though right now, in peaceful times, it may seem taking such actions is a ridiculous idea. However, when placed in such a situation, some people’s instincts will guide actions.
I clearly remember a story he told of a normally grumpy old lady who took care of a Jewish child. It was night, and she heard German officers coming up the apartment stairs and knew they were coming for the Jewish family living on her floor. From inside her apartment, she could hear the officers pounding on their door demanding it be opened. She wanted to help them, but did not know how. Right at the last moment when her neighbours' doors finally opened, the grumpy old woman angrily stormed out of her apartment and grabbed the hand of one of her neighbours, a Jewish child, and yelled: “Did I not tell you to not bother these unclean people” and then dragged the child into her apartment – right in front of the German officers. No one expected her to do anything like that, but she saved a life. She did the right thing, and risked her own life to save another.
During chapel, one of my teachers, Mrs. Chandler, made a point to emphasise the role a small village in the mountains of France played in the rescuing, aiding, sheltering and nurturing the lives of five thousand young and innocent Jewish children. Despite rewards to expose the leader behind this operation, the people of Le Chambon refused to reveal the locations of their pastor, also their leader, and the children they were hiding. Because of their brave act, five thousand children were saved from Hitler’s concentration camps. This left a great impact on Mr. Feigl, as he was one of the five thousand saved. Through this act of kindness and sacrifice, Mr. Feigl’s faith that good still exists in the world was restored. In return, he has dedicated his life to sharing his experiences of the good that existed during a time of great turmoil.
I believe Mr. Feigl’s visit to Concordia brought awareness to our community. His visit made it clear that we need to be a light in the darkness. We need to stop bullies, we must stand up and do the right thing when unjust situations arise, and we need to speak and act on behalf of those who cannot. This is a critical reason why Mr. Feigl is still travelling around the world in his 80s. He sees this need for action and has dedicated his life to raising awareness and to sharing this message.
Dulwich International Singers – Rolling Stones Performance
WOW! Singing with the Rolling Stones was truly a once in a lifetime experience that I am sure no-one involved will ever forget!
The Dulwich International Singers, made up of students, parents and staff from Dulwich College Shanghai, Suzhou and Beijing and directed by Mr. Shane O’Shea and Mr. Tim Parker were invited to sing You Can’t Always Get What You Want for the Shanghai leg of the Asian tour.
The practising was very intense, a whole weekend taken up with two days of singing and recording in the DCS Rehearsal Room, hopefully resulting in a truly fantastic performance.
On the day of the performance, we arrived at the Mercedes-Benz Arena at 12.30pm and were dropped off at the door reserved exclusively for VVIPs, we were all so excited that we were now considered more important than VIPs. However, after around half an hour of standing outside in the cold, we were eventually escorted in through the normal door. This did not dampen our spirits one bit; we were there to sing with the Stones!
We were led through the backstage area past the mountain of equipment the Rolling Stones tour with, and eventually to our dressing rooms. We had a rehearsal for about 30 minutes followed by about an hour of waiting, excitedly in the dressing room. Finally we were called onto the main stage to have our sound check where we all got to meet Mick Jagger! Some of us got to shake his hand; others found that just having him stand near us was exciting enough.
About 15 minutes later, we returned to our dressing room, waited for a while and returned back to the stage to have another sound check, this time with the Rolling Stones! After having gone through You Can’t Always Get What You Want a couple of times, we returned to an atmosphere of uncontainable excitement in the dressing rooms. This was more than enough to get us through the four hour wait and the “food”. Luckily for us, we got to sit out
in the audience for the first 8 songs before returning back stage to get ready for our performance during the encore. Getting to see them perform, along with the excitement they generated in the audience, really got us to understand how privileged we were to perform with them.
Finally, it was our time to go on stage. We all progressed in an orderly fashion onto the stage, our ears about to bleed from the volume generated by the audience. We got our cue, there was no going back now, the sopranos sang their first note and then the whole choir came in. This was the moment. We were on stage in front of an audience, with the Rolling Stones! OMG!
It was all over in just eight minutes, hours and hours of waiting and practising came down to what was almost certainly the highlight of all our musical careers. We were rushed off stage, having bowed for what was referred to as “too long” and quickly made our way back to the dressing rooms, collected our belongings and ran to the bus so as to beat the massive traffic jam that was about to be created as fifteen thousand people tried to make their way home. Luckily, we were back at school within half an hour, still in awe at what we had just done. It was truly a once in a lifetime experience.
