Neighborhood Kids

Then neighborhood kids continued to follow us as we made our way down the street. I found the communal oven on the street and was headed for #220, which I knew to be a former synagogue and now a residence. They pointed out another synagogue, which I was unaware of on the top two floors of a building. You could clearly see it from the street and I suppose that would have been enough. But for the kids it wasn’t enough. They knocked on a woman’s door and led us up an impossibly narrow and pitch-black staircase to the roof of the building. We hoped a wall and climbed to an adjacent building. The roof was full of trash and we carefully made our way to what used to be a skylight. It was now just open space. 4 of us, Jen, our neighbors, and me peered over this hole to look into what used to be a synagogue. I was sure the roof was going to collapse under our weight at any moment but it didn’t. The kids continued to point things out to us, although none of it really relevant. The whole experience was very moving. We climbed back down the stairs and thanked the kids for their help. They wanted nothing from us. Not a dirham. They were just happy to help. We later found 220 and spoke to someone outside who said it wasn’t a former synagogue although I knew it was. I had read that it was near impossible to enter this building but we tried anyways.