The Kindness Matters Podcast
So. Much. Division. Let's talk about how to change that. Re-engage as neighbors, friends, co-workers and family. Let's set out to change the world. Strike that. Change A World. One person at a time, make someone's life a little better and then do it again tomorrow and the day after that, through kindness.
Kindness is a Super-Power that each of us has within us. It is so powerful it has the potential to change not only your life but those around you, too. Let's talk about kindness.
The Kindness Matters Podcast
Resilience and Remembrance: Ben Lesser's Journey from Survival to Education Part Three
Join us for an unforgettable conversation with Holocaust survivor Ben Lesser, a remarkable 96-year-old who personifies resilience and the enduring power of humanity. Through his vivid recollections, Ben recounts the harrowing journey of the death march from Dürnhau to Buchenwald, where he faced unbearable conditions yet emerged with an unbroken spirit. His story serves as a solemn reminder of the devastating consequences of hatred and the necessity of empathy and compassion. As Ben opens his heart, we explore how kindness can be a transformative force, even in the darkest times of human history.
Beyond sharing his personal narrative, Ben discusses his transition from silence to a mission of education, inspired by a young relative's curiosity. Discover the impactful work of the Zachor Holocaust Remembrance Foundation and the innovative educational tools they've developed, including a unique online curriculum led by Ben himself. We also address the persistent rise of antisemitism and the critical importance of fostering unity through kindness. Reflect on these themes as we conclude this powerful series, and connect with us on social media to continue the conversation about building a more compassionate world.
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Well, hello there and welcome. You are listening to the Kindness Matters podcast and I am your host, mike Rathbun. What is this podcast all about? It's about kindness. It's a pushback against everything negative that we see in the news and on social media today, and it's a way to highlight people, organizations that are simply striving to make their little corner of the world a little better place. If you want to join in on the conversation, feel free, Go ahead and follow us on all of your social media feeds. We're on Facebook, instagram, tiktok. We're even on LinkedIn under Mike Rathbun. Check us out. We're even on LinkedIn under Mike Rathbun. Check us out and in the meantime, so sit back, relax, enjoy and we'll get into the Kindness Matters podcast. Hello and welcome to the Kindness Matters podcast. I am your host, mike Rathbun, and if you are just tuning in to this series, I think you should know that what you're listening to is a conversation with Mr Ben Lesser.
Speaker 1:There have been two episodes prior to this. This is the third and final episode. Mr Lesser is a 96-year-old survivor of the Holocaust and I think it's important. I know this is a conversation or a podcast about kindness and these three episodes are about the exact opposite of kindness, but I think it's important to hear Ben's story and to reflect on how that whole situation came to be. Was from a lack of kindness, I think, how one person convinced hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of other people that one group of people was to blame for all of their problems. And yes, yes, sorry, I get choked up. Thank you for joining us, thank you for sitting in and listening, and let's continue with Ben's story anyway.
Speaker 2:Yes, they dismiss us. A few weeks later at night we hear cannon fire, like the front is closing in. That morning we reported to go to work. There's a loudspeaker saying no one is working today. The camp is being evacuated. Line up in rows of five march out of the camp. I'm holding on to my cousin and my uncle is already in the kitchen and we couldn't say goodbye to him. We never saw my uncle again. I never saw him again. I don't know what happened to my uncle, but Isaac, my cousin and I holding hands, we were marching out. That was called the death march. Why did they call it the death march? Why did they call it the death march? If you did not fast I mean walk fast to keep up with the soldiers, they simply shot you and all day long we heard pop, pop, pop, pop.
Speaker 2:In my book, you're gonna see, I write that I walked in the death march three or four weeks, I didn't remember, because days and nights we were like zombies just following the orders. Day and night didn't mean anything but a German professor who read my book. He loved it so much he asked me permission to translate it into German. He says to my daughter, gail, he says your father made two mistakes in the book. One mistake was he says he marched in the death march three or four weeks. He says Mr Lesser marched seven weeks, 460 kilometers from Dürnhau to Buchenwald and he knows it took seven weeks.
Speaker 2:Don't ask me how I survived this. All I remember the last week, at least five or seven days I was walking barefooted because my shoes fell apart and snow. Walking barefooted on snow. Anyway, seven weeks and we arrived to Buchenwald. In Buchenwald they count us. They told us to go in the barrack. They're going to feed you there, you're going to get fresh clothes and new shoes to wear and you take a shower, but tomorrow morning we want you all back here because Buchenwald is also being evacuated. This is me in Buchenwald's shower. Don't ask me how this happened. That's a story in itself. Wow, somebody found this picture Anyway.
Speaker 1:This was a photograph.
Speaker 2:That was a photograph taken by someone. This was a photograph. That was a photograph taken by someone. I have that photograph, so it's a story in itself. I don't have time to talk about it. Fair enough, this was very unusual to have a photograph during.
Speaker 2:Yeah from Buchenwald. Anyway in Buchenwald, anyway in Buchenwald. The next morning we had a good night's sleep. We came down and they counted us and they marched us out because Buchenwald is also being evacuated. Outside Buchenwald, about 300 yards, we see cattle cars lined up and they line us up, 80 to a cattle car. Again, I pushed my cousin up. I says find a place against the wall, because I remember going to Auschwitz and people all around me was terrible. Find out a spot. And he went in. He found a spot against the wall. He saved a spot for me. I climbed in and saved a spot for me.
Speaker 2:Two hours later they opened up the wagon and they threw in 80 loaves of bread, a loaf of bread for each person. Picture this those people who were next to the door were grabbing three or four or five breads. I am against the wall with my cousin. We have nothing. We don't know where we're going, for, how long we're going to be gone. I need a bread.
Speaker 2:So I started to climb over the sitting inmates over their heads, to climb over the sitting inmates over their heads, to get to the door to wrestle out the bread from somebody who had many. One sitting inmate had a pocket knife and he stabs me and I feel a stab in my throat. My mouth is filling up with blood. I can't stop. I have to get a bread. I keep climbing and this man had a bunch of breads. I pull one away. He kicks me also. I put the bread in my back pocket.
Speaker 2:I come back to my cousin. He says Ben, what's happening to you? You're bleeding. I put my finger here, went right through my tongue. Oh, I had this big gash right here in the middle of my throat. Now I still have the mark here, but it's over my chin bone because I filled up, but when I was skinny it was in the middle of my throat. Oh, my gosh, you still see it. Anyway, I have one loaf of bread between the two of us. I have one loaf of bread between the two of us. I ration it out the size of a half an egg every midnight to my cousin and then the same time for myself. A little piece like this, the size of a half an egg. It lasted us two weeks. No water, just the bread. Bread was gone after two weeks. Everybody around me is dying. They're all dying.
Speaker 1:You can't live without water.
Speaker 2:I and my cousin are still alive. The only thing we got it was winter, it was still snowing. We backed the guard. Each cattle car had one guard on top of it waiting, so we begged them please give us a bucket full of snow. And this one guard gave us a bucket full of snow, so we all grabbed a little bit of snow. Anyway, this was just one time. After two weeks the bread is gone. The train is shuttling back and forth for another week. It took three weeks from Buchenwald to Dachau, shuttling around. We arrive at Dachau, they open up the doors and they yell anyone who can walk, walk out of the cattle car through the tracks of Dachau. Well, we were only 40. I mean we were 80 people in this cattle car, but only four of us walked out alive. Oh wow, Dachau Four. The other mistake this professor told us in my book. I said the train had only 3 000 people. He says the train had 6 900, almost 7 000 people in, and he knew.
Speaker 2:And he said and only four of you walked out now only 18 walked out from the 7000 in Dachau, four of us only from my barrack, from your car, from my cattle car, only four from the cattle car, the rest everybody dead. And I remember the night before it was raining and we saw some water inside the tracks. When we came down we dropped on the tracks and we licked the water. They beat us and chased us away. We came into the yard of Dachau and we see a mountain full of dead bodies. They ran out of coal to burn the bodies in the crematorium so they piled them up as high as they could and they put all right this is the pile of bodies.
Speaker 2:They put me and my cousin next to the bodies in a barrack on the floor, no bunk. Some of the inmates felt sorry for us so they gave us a little water to drink, which helped because we were parched. Anyway, one night, two nights, still no food. All we had is water. The third night we hear Bafrayung liberation, americans, americans, bafrayung liberation. I tell my cousin, let's go out and see what's going on. I tell my cousin, let's go out and see what's going on. So, holding each other, we walk out and we see inmates are crawling on their hands and knees and kissing the boots from the American GI. They look like gods to us. They liberated us.
Speaker 2:I was standing there with my cousin and two GIs walk up to us. One of them had a can of Spam. He opens up the can of Spam and he hands it to me. It smelled so good. We made a mistake. We ate some of it and both of us came down with dysentery.
Speaker 2:That night after liberation my cousin dies in my arms and I talked to him. I wouldn't let him go. He is still talking to me. I wouldn't let him go. He's still talking to me. I'm talking to my cousin and they saw that they took him away. So I followed, my knees gave out and I fell. When I fell, they pushed me against the wall.
Speaker 2:Two hours later, a nicely dressed man walks up to me and he asked me in a broken German, how many languages I speak. When I told him, he says Polish. I'm just with Polish, just with priests. I came here with nuns and with doctors from Paris and we are opening up a field hospital. I'll take you to the field hospital. He picked me up like a sack of bones. I may have weighed I was 16 and a half years old. I may have weighed 40, 50 pounds, who knows. He picks me up, he takes to the infirmary and a nun comes out, puts me on a cot with a white sheet, they take my vitals and I pass out. Ben Lesser passed out.
Speaker 2:Five weeks later I wake up in Santo Tilian, in a monastery in Bavaria. The monks gave up one building to make a hospital for the survivors of the Holocaust. That's where I woke up and my story continues. But to tell you how I met my only sister alive, how we were together in the same room. With two billion people in the world, we wind up in the same room and we don't know each other and we don't know if anyone survived and we walk away Weeks later. How we found each other. You have to read my book.
Speaker 1:This was your sister, lola.
Speaker 2:That's my sister, lola and then how Ben Lesser was able to make a beautiful life for himself in the United States of America after being a Chalut, a pioneer for Israel. Oh my God, you have to. You can't believe. You're looking at Ben Lesser. I was on Skid Row and Main Street in Los Angeles for a long time. We didn't have enough money. I say we, my friend and I, we didn't have enough money to buy a cup of coffee and to find out how I was able to turn my life around to make a beautiful life for myself. Please read my Anyone reading my book, you realize you have the same chance that I have to make a beautiful life for yourself in America. Any questions?
Speaker 1:So many I see. I wanted to ask you about the Zakor Foundation. Yeah, you started that. When did you start that?
Speaker 2:I think I started that. I'll tell you, robin, if you're still there you please tell she's there.
Speaker 3:I'm here. The Zahor Holocaust Remembrance Foundation was founded in 2009. However, my grandfather didn't speak for many years about the Holocaust. He didn't live a dark life at all. He lived literally a life that was to the fullest, because you do hear where survivors just shut down and they live pretty much a dark life. That wasn't his life at all, but my cousin he was in, I believe, fifth grade or sixth or seventh grade. Maybe he had approached him years ago and said hey, you're a Holocaust survivor, you don't talk about it. Would you talk about it? At my high school? And so he did, or his middle school, and so he did, and that was the first time that he spoke and didn't stop since. So it was close to 30, maybe even 40 years ago and he's been talking ever since.
Speaker 3:But the foundation really was born in 2009, when my grandfather was speaking speaking and I'll say it very truncated version here when he was speaking, he had a pin. It's the gold lapel pin. There's a whore pin and you can find it on our website. The same Um, yeah and um, a young lady, and he's wearing it right now and I'm sorry, I'm dressed in Halloween, so I'm not wearing it right now.
Speaker 3:Um, but uh, a young woman had come up to him and asked him what were these crazy little letters, what do they stand for? And he had said it stands for. Remember, remember the 6 million that had passed. And he handed it to her and she was ever so grateful and thankful for that little memento that this man just gave him, this Holocaust survivor. And he said please take this with you, and if somebody asks you what this means, you tell them you heard a Holocaust survivor.
Speaker 3:Well, that's kind of where the pin and the Zohor Holocaust remembrance was born. We are the sole manufacturer and distributor of those whore pins. We have distributed nearly 2 million worldwide and the goal is to distribute 6 million, and then some for each of the souls where their lives were cut so short. Where their lives were cut so short, but it's also over the years. It is now also not just a symbol of Holocaust remembrance, but it's now used as a promise, a promise to not just never forget but to never again. It's that personal promise where you're wearing it so proudful. That's why we also have other various mediums of this use of the pin, whether it be a bracelet, a pendant or the pin. It's a promise to stop hate absolutely.
Speaker 1:I, I, I cannot tell you how impactful this is. Um I again. I was born like 15 years after world war ii ended and my parents well, my, my father was was in the navy. Well, my father was in the Navy, but he served mostly in the Pacific. My brother and I were made very aware of what happened, but I think that's slipping away somewhat. I don't know what schools are teaching about it anymore, but I am so grateful and honored to be able to help keep this story alive so that nobody ever forgets what happened.
Speaker 3:I can't thank you enough for that.
Speaker 3:I know I'm speaking on behalf of my grandfather and, to answer your question, there is an ordinance out there in reference to Holocaust studies be taught in schools.
Speaker 3:It is something that is done on a state and city level and it is mandated now to have Holocaust curriculum. It's just a matter of each of the states adopting it at that time that this law had passed, because what had happened is that the problem is there's so much to teach over the years that the teachers they have to teach world war ii, but how much are they teaching of the actual holocaust? And we heard a lot of feedback that they were inundated with material so they didn't know what to pull from. So really at the height of COVID actually the start of COVID, when everything was shut down we had launched the first ever Holocaust online Holocaust curriculum taught by a survivor, ben himself, and this was the first ever out there. It's a truncated version, it's his story, but it is very factual. It talks about the entire historical, what led to World War II, to and through the hate that stemmed the Holocaust, all the way to how you could recognize and distinguish stereotypes, biases, all leading up to hate, right.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:Also, we can all live a tolerant, hate-free world. So, and these all have lesson plans for teachers and this is being used, utilized worldwide. I can't even I mean there's so many countries that are using this free curriculum because they're not all free. This is free and this is something that we pride ourselves. Specifically, this is Ben's legacy. He wants to continue teaching his story for years on end. And we also have an AI, which is pretty really cool feature to have.
Speaker 1:I saw that on the website.
Speaker 3:It is very cool. You just ask Ben a question and he will answer. It is brought to a lot of teachers in the schools not just to use the curriculum but read his book and then the kids can ask their own questions. It really brings it to life. Because you said it in the beginning of the podcast when my grandfather was telling his story you said I've heard about the Holocaust, I know about the Holocaust, but hearing your story and seeing the pictures takes it to a completely different level it does.
Speaker 1:I mean, and again, I know I learned about it, I learned about it at school and when you showed the pictures of the crematoriums, and when you showed the pictures of the crematoriums I was like I've seen pictures similar to that. But hearing Ben's words, with those pictures it just took it what you said. It took it to such an amazing other level. And you know the other thing and you can tell me if this is off base or if you don't want to talk about it, but we have seen a rise in anti-Semitism lately, both in this country and around the world.
Speaker 2:I was wondering if Ben had any thoughts on why that's happening. Antisemitism was in the world. Well, ever since there were Jewish people in the world. Now it always exists and it will be Because of what's happening. The anti-Semitism has to stop and we are doing everything possible. I'm doing everything possible not just here in the United involved.
Speaker 2:I am in Germany and I hope to talk to the Chancellor pretty soon to see if we can do something. You know, in Germany, in Bavaria, you see this book, oh yeah, to Konstantin McGagan. It means you can meet him and the death train and all this book by a German professor who read my book and he made a short version of it 60 pages only talking about the Holocaust itself, only Ben Lesser during the Holocaust. Now, and the Bavarian government has seen it and they liked it so much they printed out these books, dear beautiful books, only six pages, and they gave it out to each high school kid in Bavaria, nice, wow, that's great. You know what that means. Not all of Bavaria, but a big portion of Bavaria anyway, and I am now working everything possible to see if all of Germany wouldn't do it. This is a book that is free of charge. You're giving it to them, but somebody has to be willing to print them. It's all there.
Speaker 3:I just want to answer a little bit of your question in regards to the rise of anti-semitism. One of the things that my grandfather talks about so freely and so often is education is the bet, is really the pathway to defeat the increase. You know racism and no intolerance out there and so many people are just not educated, and hence the reason why we are. I mean, he's 96 and he was just been on the call with you for a couple of hours. He speaks to multiple people daily. In know his story to never forget and never again. But I mean, education is really the key. It's also people don't listen to one another because they're not educated. If they, you, you know you can. You can talk to someone, but are they really listening? Are they really hearing what you're saying and are you compassionate enough to empathize? And this is the struggles that we face today.
Speaker 2:If I could add this, mike, can you hear me? Yes, okay, robin is correct, but it has to be the right education. We don't want to create educated Eichmanns or educated Hitlers. Right, the education has to be the right. Stop the hatred. There's no room for this. The German people were beautiful people before World War I, even before World War II yeah, that could be a whole other five episode series, I'm sure educated mad men changed the whole world.
Speaker 1:Yes, so it has to be the right education, and this one other thing about your website that I saw, that I liked so much, is the.
Speaker 2:I shout out yes that is amazing remember you're gonna be on the. Your picture even will come out. Oh, nobody needs to see that generations to come.
Speaker 1:I plan on writing something soon.
Speaker 2:I mean this is to come. I plan on writing something soon. I mean, this is so unusual. Who ever heard of such a thing Agreed. I mean I shout out something that's going to remain for generations to come. No one ever did something like that.
Speaker 1:No, this will live on long, long long, probably after I'm gone, and that's a good thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a good thing.
Speaker 3:That's the goal.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for having me. My wife is going to kill me because I'm missing dinner all right so I I apologize for if I feel, if I seem like I'm cutting this short, but I you have been so incredibly generous with your time, both ben and robin, and I so appreciate it. I will probably be splitting this up into multiple episodes, but thank you, thank you, thank you for what you're doing and what you've done, thank you.
Speaker 2:Send us some of the episodes. I will do it.
Speaker 1:I will do it.
Speaker 3:Have a lovely evening.
Speaker 1:You too, robin. Thank you, ben. And that will bring us to the end of Ben Lesser's story Not really, I mean, he's still alive. He has many stories to tell yet and I think it's amazing that he is able to recall all of these horrors.
Speaker 1:And you know, usually I say at the end of my episodes I hope you take something away from the episode, something good, something motivational, something inspirational.
Speaker 1:And I hope the same is true with this series of episodes, because we can never forget, we can never again allow a person to tell us that a certain group of individuals or race or color or anything else is responsible for our problems and incite violence against them. And that's where I wanted to go with this episode. That's what I wanted to talk about. That's where I wanted to go with this episode. That's what I wanted to talk about, that's the point I wanted to get across, and I hope, despite all the horrors that we've been talking about in these episodes, that you take something positive away from it, the work that Ben has done. I will have all of his links in the show notes to prevent something like this from happening again. I hope you hear that and it resonates with you and we can move forward as a united society, as a society that works together for a common good for peace, together for a common good for peace, and that will do it for this series of episodes on the Kindness Matters podcast.
Speaker 1:I appreciate you listening. Make sure you follow us on all of our social media channels and have a good, good week. You've been listening to the Kindness Matters podcast. I'm your host, Mike Rathbun. Take care and be kind to each other.
