Day 6 (29Jun) - Auschwitz & Berkinau

Good-bye, Warsaw! The bus was packed and loaded and we headed south at 9:00 am. It was a pretty sleepy crowd until close to noon; most of us were curled up and catching up on some much-needed sleep! We stopped for lunch at a well-known and well-loved Polish fast-food restaurant – McDonald’s! Most of the workers spoke enough English to understand us when we ordered. We wondered if that was the case in the U.S.

Then it was on to the most emotional part of the trip for many of us – the killing camps of Auschwitz and Berkinau. Our singers were incredibly respectful as we entered that sacred ground. We stopped at Birkinau first, and walked through the barracks designed to hold 45 horses and ended up housing 700-1000 prisoners. I watched as individuals – both adults and children – wandered across the ground and along the railway tracks where so many thousands of people were unloaded and divided into those who lived and those who went straight to the gas chambers. We traveled down the road a mile or so to Auschwitz where again, everyone was silent as we walked through the barracks, viewed the displays of shoes, hair brushes, luggage and personal belongings of those who were killed in this place not that long ago. We experienced tears, frustration, questioning, and anger as we walked from room to room and viewed and experienced what had happened to tens of thousands of people in this part of the world.

Back on the bus it took us quite a while to get back to normalcy . . . it was difficult to talk. It was impossible to laugh. Our thoughts were dark and centered on the cruelty and viciousness we had witnessed. But gradually conversations were started, experiences and feelings were shared, and before we knew it we were entering Krakow.

Dinner was at a wonderful, very beautiful restaurant called “Amadeus.” We finished at about 10:00 and part of the group walked into the old town square. Most of us, however, walked back to the hotel and are ready for sleep. Tomorrow will be a busy day and we’re hoping for another incredible concert tomorrow night.

I’m ready for sleep!
Sandy Miller

Day 5 (29Jun) - Warsaw

Most of us are truly thankful for a good night’s sleep last night. All of us went to bed as soon as we got back to the hotel, and we’re feeling great this morning!

We boarded the bus and our city guide, Jola, was wonderful as she introduced us to Warsaw. We drove by many embassies, including our own and also saw many government buildings. We left the bus and walked through Tazienki Park, the focus of which was a huge statue of Frederick Chopin. The singers had a good time being outdoors and having a chance to run around. There were peacocks roaming the grounds but they didn’t like us much. They would run if we approached them (better than attacking us, I thought!) We visited the site of the Warsaw ghetto where a large Jewish Museum is being built. We heard the story of the relocating of the Jewish community into that small area and then the transport system taking them to the extermination camps
At Treblinka..

We ended up before lunch in the Old Town, and broke into small groups to have lunch. Most of us ate at outdoor restaurants because the weather was so beautiful. Lots of us ate traditional Polish food including perogis, sausages, dumplings and, of course, that famous Polish pizza! We had plenty of time to roam around, shop, and explore the Old Town before heading back to the hotel to dress for the concert.

We warmed up at St. John’s Cathedral at 5:30 and sang through a few of our songs for the concert. The organist/director of music at the Cathedral then asked me if we could also sing for the Mass that was being celebrated at 7:00. Much to our surprise, we discovered that the Archbishop of Warsaw and the Cardinal of Poland (the position held by John Paul II before he was elected pope) were the celebrants. The church was packed with people standing, and the procession of clergy was impressive. We sang “Alleluia” as the processional, the “Kyrie” and “Agnus Dei” portions of the Faure Mass, Schubert’s “Benedictus” and “Panis Angelicus.” I was pleasantly surprised that most people stayed following the mass, and our concert was the best we have sung so far. In fact, the congregation demanded an encore. Wow! We were so touched.

We had a late dinner at a folklore restaurant and the food was great! We started off with a wonderful soup, followed by a large serving of beef stew folded into a giant potato pancake. Dessert was vanilla, chocolate and strawberry ice cream served in a huge cookie. Needless to say, none of us are losing any weight!

A couple of us had visitors while we were in Warsaw. Marjorie Luscher’s granddaughter, Meredith and her husband attended the concert so I got to visit with them.

Sandy Miller

Day 4 (28Jun) - Berlin to Warsaw

Whoa . . .what happened here? Up at 4:30! 4:30??? Unfortunately, that is correct . . . we were up early, picked up a boxed breakfast, boarded the bus and headed for the Berlin train station. Our train was scheduled to depart at 6:29 am and OCC was well prepared. We lined all the suitcases up on the platform and when the train arrived, we were ready. We had a “chain gang” that passed 40+ pieces of luggage person-to-person and onto the train. Then another group on board the train moved the suitcases into the compartments and up (yes, UP!!) onto a high shelf. Whew!! We reversed the process as we left the train. We knew we had only four minutes to disembark; we made it in 2.25! Pretty impressive, eh???

We walked to our hotel, which is only a couple of blocks from the station. It is a Holiday Inn (not my favorite) but it is big and air-conditioned and right across the street from Warsaw’s large shopping center. Our singers have certainly enjoyed that. Just ask Katy Nugent! After checking in and freshening up, we traveled to the People’s Palace, the tallest building in all of Poland, and traveled to the top to get a bird’s eye view of Warsaw. The People’s Palace was built as a gift to the Polish people by Stalin. The people of Poland are not fond of it, for that very reason!

We boarded our beautiful, brand new Mercedes-Benz coach and went to Old Town for dinner. We had a private room and our dinner started with a wonderful tomato bisque, followed by a large serving of roast with gnocchi. Dessert was a cake that we all enjoyed. Back to the hotel and we all fell into bed!

To the Fukomoto family – from all indications, Tyler is having a great time. He’s talking and laughing a lot, taking lots and lots of pictures and the boys are all moving around together as a group . . . we’re calling them “The Wolf Pack.”

To Sydney, Emily and Hannah’s parents – wow! They are all singing well, cooperative, making a point of being “buddies” with some of the younger singers and, from all indications, they, too are doing great. No complaints from any of them so far!

Big day tomorrow!
Sandy Miller

Day 3 (27Jun) - Berlin

Another huge breakfast was awaiting our group early this morning. Everyone was up and cheerful and ready to face the day, and what a beautiful day it was! The sun was shining, the sky was blue and the temperature was in the 70’s . . . no rain! Very pleasant!

Our singers walked to the Kaiser Wilhelm church at 8:15 to warm up and rehearse for the morning service and a short concert to follow. The bombed out portion of the church still stands with a very modern sanctuary adjoining it on one side, and an equally modern bell tower on the other. The church contains something like 31,000 windows, all of which are made of an incredibly beautiful blue glass. The service was interesting. They honored their kindergarten, and there were lots of children involved in the service. They even did a little play about Zacchaeus which was pretty cute. OCC sang four movements from a Faure Mass, “Kyrie,” “Sanctus,” “Benedictus” and “Agnus Dei.” We also sang “Sushepit Israel” and “Alleluia.”

We walked back to our hotel, changed clothes and formed small groups to go out for lunch. Some of the singers decided to have a traditional Berlin dish, “Currywurst.” Others visited the brand new Berlin “Hard Rock Café”. Berlin has lots of choices for dining – little restaurants with tiny tables outdoors, and on a day like today, it was perfect!

Without too much time to spare, we found out way back to the hotel. With every move we made, we encountered someone or a group of “someones” discussing the upcoming “football” game – the quarterfinals of the World Cup Soccer match between England and Germany. Most of us really got into the spirit of the game – several boys purchased “Deutschland” scarves in bright red, gold and black.

We changed into our new formal outfits – the girls in long, black dresses not unlike Choir III’s, and the boys into tuxes complete with vests and bowties and all of a sudden, our singers were transformed into beautiful young ladies and gentlemen – they looked fantastic! We boarded the bus and were off to a 6:00 concert at the Evangelische Kirche am Hohenzollernplatz, a contemporary church designed to resemble the prow of a ship. The stained glass windows were beautiful and the acoustics were breath-taking. Since the football game ended around 5:30, our audience was rather sparse, but we felt so “professional” afterward in that we sang our entire program well and without any major errors. We were warmly welcomed by the congregation and arrived back at the hotel feeling confident, thankful, and very, very tired!

Sandy Miller

Day 2 (26Jun) - Berlin

Breakfast this morning was the traditional OCCYC travel breakfast - cold cuts, hot ham, scrambled eggs, oranges, orange juice, any cereal imaginable, apple juice, all kinds of breads, lots of cheese, pickled carrots, sauerkraut - anything anyone would want, they could provide! All our travelers ate lots and lots of breakfast, then we boarded the coach and did a city tour of Berlin guided by a lovely woman who was born and raised in East Berlin. We took lots of pictures at Checkpoint Charlie, stopped at the East Side Gallery, a portion of the original wall now devoted to art, visited many of the embassies, including our own, saw the concert hall built for Berlin by the U.S. (they call the "pregnant oyster" or "Jimmy Carter's smile" ) . . Piques your curiosity, doesn't it?

At noon Sandy and Ray and Sandy H. visited the church where we will hold our concert tomorrow evening while the rest of the group had lunch. We met back up at the Brandenburg Gate at 1:30, lined up and sang "Didn't My Lord Deliver Daniel" and "O Desayo" - without accompaniment, of course. No one wanted to stop singing, because we were suddenly surrounded by tourists and Berliners who seemed thrilled with what they were hearing! It's one thing to have your parents take pictures of you, but it's kind of fun to have onlookers you don't know taking pictures and videos while you sing! There are going to be a lot of photos of OCC floating around the world after this tour!

We divided up into interest groups and spent the afternoon doing what we wanted to. Lots of us visited the Holocaust Museum which was pretty sobering and clearly told the story of what happened here in Berlin and Germany 60 or so years ago. Some of us saw a wonderful chocolate factory - are you aware that German chocolate is considered the finest chocolate in the world, by the German people, anyway? Several of us rode the elevator to the top of the Reichstag (one of the government buildings) which gave us an incredibly comprehensive view of the city. Others visited a museum of ancient musical instruments, bought jewelry at a discount!- because the owner asked to hear them sing. There were only four in that group, but the owner (whose wife is a singer) was so impressed he offered a discount on the jewelry purchased!

We were back at our hotel by 7:00 p.m. and walking to a restaurant for dinner by 7:15. Dinner was excellent! Our "starter" was tomato soup, followed by a large cut of "schnitzel" (breaded pork) and wonderful potato salad. Dessert was a German "crepe" with a fruit compote. Some of us liked it and some of us didn't!, but we all had plenty to eat!

Wakeup tomorrow is at 6:30 a.m. We'll have breakfast and sing a service at the Kaiser Wilhelm Church at 10:00. After the service, we'll present a 30 minute concert. Then back to the hotel and out to lunch, followed by "back to the hotel" and 3:00 departure for our evening concert. We're a little worried . . . Germany plays England in the World Cup tomorrow at 4:00 p.m. If Germany wins, we're thinking everyone will be out in the streets celebrating, not coming to our concert. If Germany loses, who knows what will happen . . . in any case, we'll sing a 6:00 concert and we're hoping we have an audience. (So is the pastor of the church!)

Every singer is doing well, in good spirits, smiling a lot and very thrilled with the opportunities they've been given. What an incredible group of travelers. More to come . . . .

Sandy Miller

Day 1 - Oregon Children's Choir in Berlin!!

Our 4:00 a.m. meeting time at PDX was none too early (although all of us were certainly complaining about the early hour!). We met, received our e-tickets and lined up as a group for check in. Whoops! Where are your passports? In your backpack back in your home you say? After being clocked at records speeds between PDX and Beaverton and PDX, they were recovered just in time. As we expected, check-in went fairly slowly. As we grew close to the end of the check-in, we were told that one of our adult tickets had been canceled. Everyone else in the choir, singers and chaperones, finally moved on to the gate to board the plane. Finally, at the last minute, Diana Harrell was declared "legal" and "worthy to travel" and she and I moved through security as fast as we could and headed to the gate. We were greeted by one of the pilots asking if we were "from the choir". We assured him we were, boarded the plane, the doors were closed and we were off to New York.

We had lunch together in the airport at JFK, then moved on to the plane taking us to Berlin. After boarding and closing the doors, we were told that our departure time had been delayed by almost two hours . . . I don't know what anyone else did, but I promptly went to sleep and slept until takeoff. We were served dinner . . . well, we were served a very small portion of chicken or pasta . . . than most of us curled up in our seats and slept until we neared Berlin.

Peter, our tour guide who was also OYC's guide a year ago, met us and welcomed us and we were off to the Mark Hotel. Believe it or not . . . (drum roll) . . . our rooms were ready and VOILA . . . we checked in, brushed our teeth, assured ourselves that we could stay awake for a few more hours and walked to the Berlin Zoo. It was a beautiful afternoon and the animals were in great form . . . a huge polar bear stood up on his hind feet and washed his face for us! . . . we were able to watch the giant hippopotami (is the plural for hippopotamus???) swimming underwater and coming to the surface to show us their very, very large open mouths . . . the tiny goats in the petting zoo showed us how to provide treats for them (and if we didn't, they showed us how they expressed their disappointment!I) . . . our boys, dressed in their red T-shirts, entered the lion area and approached a female lion whose favorite color obviously was not red! She objected loudly and rudely and her roars were heard all over the zoo. Thank you, OCC boys!! Babies cried, smaller animals hid, and OCC was thrilled at the reaction of the lions!

Dinner tonight was at the hotel and we quite good. I'm not sure what was served, but we all ate it and no one landed face-down in their plate. However, it is now 9:30 p.m. on Friday evening in Berlin and almost everyone is asleep! We'll check rooms in a few minutes, but I'm confident everyone is tucked in and tuckered out. More tomorrow!! Good . . ni . . z z z z z z z z z . . . . . .Wake up call tomorrow at 7:30 a.m.

Sandy Miller