#1 catch up: day at the beach / Museum of Tolerance

Well graduation week was a whirlwind and so I will start with the beginning of the week and some fun time spent with our out of town family. Marlys (Gregs mom) and his sister Char flew in on Monday night, and so Tuesday we did a low key day of driving down to Huntington Beach for lunch on the pier at Ruby's... and we even saw quite a few dolphin, and a guy who used the width of the end of the pier scrambling to pull in a stingray he hooked... only to lose it at it surfaced towards the awaiting basket.. it was a pretty good sized one.. We than drove down PCH down through Laguna Beach and than did some errands on the way home. Ashley had to go to school and so she met us at home in her scrubs and so took a photo with the family.





Wednesday, we went to LA and the Museum of Tolerance. It was somewhere that I had not ever been but had it in my mind to go there the week after graduation if we didn't do it this day. Ashley was able to join the Marlys, Char and I in attending this. It was a very interesting place that is not merely all about the Holocaust, while this is a big part of it with the exhibits of artifacts, lifesize models you walked through of ghettos, gas chambers etc.. In the afternoon they have actual survivors who you can sit and listen to for about an hour each, who tell you first hand the situations they endured, what they saw, felt, smelled, fear, pain, sadness, terror... and yet someone else stepping up to "help" them escape death. You really have many exhibits that have you come face to face with your own prejudice in how you speak, your actions, and opinions of those of other ethnic culture and skin color in our lives today. It also gave you information of places in the world where "holocaust" has been happening 1/2 million Kurds in Iraq by Sadam Hussein, like Darfur currently is happening in the genocide, Africa and the tsutsi tribes (spelling?) and how it could happen again in the world when we become less than diligent in stepping in to defend the helpless who are terrorized by ideologies and discrminations where hatred is carried out. Where hatred breeds it is a dangerous igniter to attrocities. So it was a very compelling 5 hours spent and more was left to be seen, but it was so busy we had to bypass some exhibits and didn't get back to them. I've heard that the one in Washington or New York is a fantastic exhibit as well..