The Pianist Made Me Cry

I open my eyes and look around me. The air is filled with grey smoke. The streets are strewn with bloody, mangled corpses of men, women, and children. The blue Star of David still clearly seen on the now blood-stained band around their arm. The blast of the bomb had crumbled the buildings to a sad ruin. In a distance, I could still hear the dull sound of guns, and the low rumbling of war tanks. Next to me, my husband was starting to get up on his feet. He handed me our baby, took my hand, and we ran. 

This is the scene in my dream.

I am so glad that what I had just written down is just a dream--actually, it was nightmare. That's the kind of dream you get after watching a Holocaust movie before going to bed.


I stayed up until 4AM to watch "The Pianist", a movie by Roman Polanski. It tells the real-life story of a very skilled pianist and how he suffered as a Jew in the overcrowded ghettos, how he lost his family as they were sent away in a cargo train to be burned as human fuel, and how he fought to survive until the war ended.


 I normally don't like watching gory war movies alone. Watching it with someone else would somehow lighten the mood and I wouldn't focus so much on the real life drama. But last night, I'm glad I was alone. I cried so much, it was embarrassing. But no one can watch a Holocaust movie and not be moved to tears. It was horrible--all the cruelty, the starvation, the bloodshed. Families were separated, brothers and fathers murdered in front of their wife and sister and children... I imagined myself in their situation, and I couldn't stand it. It broke my heart just to think about it.

A touching scene in the movie.

Yes, the movie made me cry, but it also made me happy and thankful at the same time. I'm thankful that I don't have to experience what the Jews went through. It made me appreciate life and freedom so much. I can roam the streets without any fear of being shot to death. When I want to eat, I just open the refrigerator. My family and I are still together. I can sleep peacefully and wake up with a smile. These are the little blessings in life which are often taken for granted.


I don't regret watching the movie. Yes it was sad, and heavy, and it gave me one heck of a nightmare (funny though...why did I have a husband and baby in my dream? Hehe), but the movie made me realize what a wonderfully sweet, peaceful, and comfortable life I have.


Next on my movie list: "Life is Beautiful".