During the Holocaust, ordinary people were perpetrators, bystanders, rescuers, witnesses – and ordinary people were victims. Supported by Aberdeen Holocaust Memorial Committee, Aberdeen City Council and many local organisations, this event is an opportunity for us to come together to remember the victims and survivors of all genocides.
Programme
Friday 27 January, 12noon-1pm
Cowdray Hall (Aberdeen Art Gallery)
HMD Commemoration with readings, music and a special youth dance performance.
11.45am
Piano Recital
Orit Adam
12noon
Opening of the Holocaust Memorial Day commemoration
Tommy Campbell
Welcome and introduction of speakers, interpreters and programme
Moment of silence
12.10pm
Anne’s Diary Tutu’s Senior Dance Group
Anne’s Diary tells the story of how an ordinary teenage girl and her diary with its message of hope, changed the world.
12.20pm
Reading Extract from ‘Mimmy’ -Zlata’s Diary which was written during the Bosnian Genocide
Amina Deli Begovic
12.25pm
Reading Extract from ‘Mimmy’ – Zlata’s Diary
Mirela Delibegovic
Zlata Filipovic was born on 3 December 1980. She was living in Sarajevo before the Bosnian war started. During the war, Zlata kept a diary, which she named Mimmy, from 1991 to 1993. Zlata and her family escaped to Paris in 1993, where they stayed for a year before settling down in Dublin, Ireland.
12:30 pm
Piano recital Orit Adam Franz Schubert's Fantasie
12.45pm
Extract from the book ‘ The River Runs Salt, Runs Sweet’
Patricia Findlay
The River Runs Salt, Runs Sweet is a young woman's powerful and inspiring memoir of love, loss and survival during The Bosnian War.
12.50pm
Erika’s suitcase Pupil from Harlaw Academy Exhibition
12.55pm
Lessons from Auschwitz
Pupils from Aberdeen Grammar School
1.00pm
Reflection and thanks
Lord Provost
Friday 6 - Tuesday 31 January
Aberdeen Central Library
Passport for Life exhibition telling the story of Polish diplomats in Switzerland who cooperated with the Jewish community to save Jews from the Holocaust.
Monday 9 January, 8pm
Aberdeen Central Library
(TBC)- Lecture with Professor Roger Moorhouse and Monika Maniewska, organised by the Polish Association Aberdeen and Aberdeen City Council.
Monday 23 January, 7pm
Robert Gordon's College (with the author joining online)
A book discussion group organised by Aberdeen Interfaith. The book discussed will be The River Runs Salt, Runs Sweet: A Memoir of Visegrad, Bosnia by Jasmina Dervisevic-Cesic. For more information, contact Patricia (p.a.findlay@btopenworld.com)
27-31 January 2023
Cowdray Hall (Aberdeen Art Gallery)
Exhibition: Erika’s Suitcase
To coincide with World Holocaust Memorial Day, this small exhibition tells the story Erika Schulhof, an Austrian girl who came to Aberdeen as part of the Kindertransport. The exhibition includes artworks by pupils at Harlaw Academy and Cults Academy, which were inspired by Erika’s story and the plight of refugees today.
Friday 27 January, 2-4pm
HMD Four Pillars Commemoration
Presented by: Four Pillars, guest online appearance Dr Anna Hájková from University of Warwick.
Four Pillars joins organisations across Aberdeen to commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day where we shed light on LGBT+ lives during that period. We will be joined by Anna Hájková, Co-director of Warwick Centre for Global Jewish Studies. The event will involve the screening of a play, ‘The Amazing Life of Margot Heuman’, which Dr Hájková has worked on with her colleague, Dr Erika Hughes, from the University of Portsmouth.
Friday 27 January, 4.30pm
Music, readings and lighting of candles
James MacKay Hall, King’s College Conference Centre, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen AB24 3DR
If you're involved with schools or youth education, please see a recording of our recent event to find out about the amazing range of resources available to support Holocaust education: Holocaust Memorial session for schools
Further information
27 January marks the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi death camp. It is now Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD), the international day to remember the six million Jews murdered during the Holocaust, alongside the millions of other people killed under Nazi persecution of other groups, and in genocides that followed in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur. Each year across the UK, thousands of people come together on Holocaust Memorial Day to learn more about the past and take action to create a safer future.
The Aberdeen Holocaust Memorial Day Organising Committee is a partnership made up of: Aberdeen City Council, Aberdeen Interfaith, Four Pillars, GREC, the Polish Association Aberdeen, Unite the Union, the University of Aberdeen, and community members.
