August 23 is the European Day of Remembrance for Victims of Stalinism and Nazism created by the European Parliament in 2008. This day is also the day on which in 1939 the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact was signed. A Pact that allowed for Germany under Hitler and Soviet Union under Stalin to divide much of Europe. To commemorate this day, you are invited to a screening of the film “Memory is our Homeland”.

Produced by Jonathan Durand, this film charts the lost story of Polish refugees in Africa during WWII – a journey that brought a group of children to labour camps in Siberia, onward to Iran, India, and East Africa, to new lives across the global Polish diaspora. It follows the story of Kazia Kolodziej (née Gerech), the filmmaker’s grandmother, and other Polish refugees, as they meditate on the meaning of memory, identity, and homeland. Grappling with memories of a traumatic exile in the Soviet Union, followed by an adolescence full of discovery in a Polish refugee camp near the foot of Mount Kilimanjaro, we see how these children’s lives have been shaped by early years fraught with insecurity and change.

RSVP here or to dowi@jhbholocaust.co.za

THURSDAY 22 AUGUST 2024, 7PM (SAST)