ZYDOWSKA KORUPCJA POLONIJNEJ MJODZIEZY W WASZYNKTO

[Gość: ZYDOWSKA KORUPCJA]

ZYDOWSKA KORUPCJA POLONIJNEJ MJODZIEZY W WASZYNKTONIE

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* POLISH GLOBAL VILLAGE ** NEWS AND EVENTS ** POLISH GLOBAL VILLAGE *
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Dear readers of Marcin Zmudzki's Polish Global Village,

My name is Dennis Misler. I am the President of the Polish/American/
Jewish Alliance for Youth Action, Inc., or PAJA as we are best known.
Marcin Zmudzki has published several articles about our organization.
I am taking this opportunity to let you know how you can find out
more about PAJA and, if you are interested, to participate in at
least one of our efforts.


FIND OUT MORE ABOUT PAJA

PAJA has a Group on MSN. It is a place where people send emails to
all the members, post photos and generally engage each other in
conversations about issues related to the Polish/Jewish dialogue. I
invite you to take a look. The address is

groups.msn.com/PAJAAllianceforYouthAction
What follows are two articles about recent activities of PAJA. The
first article was published in the Washington Jewish Week. It is an
article about PAJA workshop, "Developinig Connections," held in
November at the Embassy of the Republic of Poland.

The second article is about the PAJA group that saw Roman Polanski's
"The Pianist" together and then gathered afterward at a restaurant to
discuss the movie.

I hope you find them and our work interesting. Please let me know
what you think.

Dennis Misler
[e-mail]
www.polishandjewishyouth.org/


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* POLISH GLOBAL VILLAGE ** NEWS AND EVENTS ** POLISH GLOBAL VILLAGE *
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DISCUSS THE UNDISCUSSABLE

December 5, 2002

Polish American Jewish Alliance works to open minds

by Paula Amann
News Editor
Washington Jewish Week


Stereotypes were shattering in a circle of folding chairs set around
a high-ceilinged room at the Embassy of Poland.

"Sometimes I think wešre forced to use these stereotypes," said
Kasia Bulatewicz, 20, a Polish American with long blond hair that
half hides her face. "When I see you, I just see you, not just the
Jewish you."

She heads up Club Polonia, a Polish social group, at George
Washington University.

Another young woman summed up a day full of such conversations,
putting similar sentiments in a different frame.

"It's about Jewish Americans putting a face on Polish Americans and
Polish Americans putting a face on Jewish Americans," said Isadora
"Izzy" Bodian, 18, a Jewish student at American University.

The two were among 16 high school and college students taking part
in "Developing Connections," a workshop organized by the Polish
American Jewish Alliance for Youth Action, Inc. The Silver Spring
nonprofit aims to root out prejudice and intolerance through
education, formal and informal, of young people aged 16 to 20 years
in the United States and Poland.

Launched two years ago, PAJA grew out of a friendship between Silver
Spring's Dennis Misler, a Jewish organizational development
specialist, and Zofia Zager, a Polish-born civil engineer who lives
in Fairfax County. After frequent trips to Poland, the duo would
compare notes on anti-Semitism and Polish-Jewish relations.

"We said we have to stop chatting and commiserating about this and do
something, if itšs a concern to us," said Misler, now PAJA
president.

The group's co-founders believed they could best transform deeply
held attitudes by working with youth, he explained.

PAJA held its first workshop on Nov. 21 at the Embassy of the
Republic of Poland. The high school and college age participants
held spirited discussions and brainstormed action ideas.

On an easel hung a list of ground rules for the workshop, including
"Listen for understanding" and "Discuss the undiscussable."

Polish filmmaker Daniel Strehlau lamented that many Jewish young
people touring his country today see just the artifacts of the Nazi
occupation and miss the 700-some years of Jewish history that went
before it.

"They are visiting only the death camps and cemeteries, so they have
stereotypes about Poland, too, because the history of Jews in Poland
is much older than the Holocaust," said the Jewish Strehlau.

The independent filmmaker got a chance to remedy this ignorance.
PAJA's inaugural workshop ended with the showing of Strehlau's
documentary about the renewal of Jewish life in Warsaw, "Hannukah:
A Double Time."

The film offers a kaleidoscope of the city's Jews today. They range
from the woman president of the community, to a twentysomething
convert returning to his family's roots, to the teen-age editor of a
Jewish magazine, Yiddele.

The young journalist wears his identity with confidence. "I feel 100
percent Polish and 100 percent Jewish," he tells the camera.

In the meeting room of the Polish embassy, the audience was stirred.

"I never saw this side of Jewish life presented," said Bulatewicz.
"I'm speechless."

Misler hopes to gather the group early next year for a follow-up
meeting to lay out specific action steps. Meanwhile, a delegation
from PAJA is planning to attend a Dec. 10 event at the U.S. Holocaust
Memorial Museum honoring Zegota, a group of Polish Christians who
rescued Jews during the Holocaust.


[The above article was "reprinted" from Washington Jewish Week with
author's permission. You can read the Washington Jewish Week online
at www.washingtonjewishweek.com/ ]



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* POLISH GLOBAL VILLAGE ** NEWS AND EVENTS ** POLISH GLOBAL VILLAGE *
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PAJA GROUP SEES AND DISCUSSES "THE PIANIST"


Fifteen friends of PAJA and participants in previous PAJA programs
came together Sunday, Janauary 19, in Washington, D.C., to see Roman
Polanski's award film "The Pianist." Following the film, the group
walked to a local eatery where they broke bread together and
discussed their impressions of the film.

The group found the movie extraordinary. They were mostly struck by
the realistic portrayal of the conditions in the Warsaw Ghetto, by
the starkness of the presentation of the arbitrariness of the pure
evil of the Nazis as they endeavored to subjugate and then annihilate
the Jewish population and destroy Warsaw, the failure of which was
represented by the survival of the movie's main character, Wladyslaw
Szpilman. Balance was another theme that the group came away with
from the movie. To a person, there was the feeling that the Poles
and Jews portrayed in the movie reflected the good, the heroic as
well as the bad that any individual in times of extreme danger are
subject to becoming, regardless of nationality or religion.

PAJA, The Polish/American/Jewish Alliance for Youth Action, is a non-
profit organization whose purposes are:

1.

To bring Jewish and non-Jewish Polish and American young people
together to share perspectives and develop a dialogue with each
other around the history and current state of Polish/Jewish relations
and

2.

To support efforts by PAJA youth in America and Poland that serve to
affect positive change in the world.


For more information about PAJA go to our website at

www.polishandjewishyouth.org/
You can also call our office at

[phone]

or email us at

[e-mail]