In April 1984, for the first time, Poland allowed delegations from abroad to mark Holocaust Remembrance Day, participate in a rally commemorating the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, and visit the Nazi death camps on its soil. The delegation from Israel included Holocaust survivors who returned to their former homes for the first time, along with artists and creators, most of them from the second generation of survivors. The artists – including theater director Omri Nitzan, playwright and director Shmuel Hasfari, author and playwright Nava Semel, and artist Haim Maor – were surprised by the connection they suddenly felt to places where their parents had lived and suffered. Writer Amnon Shamosh, born in Aleppo, Syria, also admits feeling connected to the Jewish culture that permeates the sites and that are familiar to him from the area where Polish immigrants concentrated in Israel, earning the nickname “Little Warsaw.” It’s the same Jewish culture that is present in the plays staged in Yiddish on theater stages and in the Judaica objects they found in the markets.

In addition to the emotional intensity of the experience, director Nitza Gonen had another challenge to face while making the film: Polish authorities didn’t allow her to bring a camera crew from Israel, so she was forced to hire a local crew that spoke only Polish and communicate with them using hand gestures.