It was as if I had been there before. Poland-so desolate, so isolated, so foreign-yet standing at the Umschlagplatz memorial this past February sparked a sensation that ran through me and made the scene almost familiar.My grandfather, Moshe Kriegsman, whose namesake I represent, grew up in Warsaw, Poland, but at the age of 25 was sent to the Auschwitz concentration camp.

I had never met him, never spoken to him, never seen him. But the connection I felt was indescribable. For the first time, a Kriegsman had come back to his heritage. As I stood there, all I could do was stare.

A small sign in the corner read, "Along this path of suffering, over 300,000 Jews were driven in 1942-1943 from the Warsaw ghetto to the gas chambers of the Nazi Extermination Camps." Those words pierced my eyes and will forever remain engraved within me.

Although my grandfather survived the war as a barber for the German soldiers, the rest of his family was brutally murdered. But then it hit me: I was standing in the very same place the Kriegsman family last held their belongings, spoke with other friends and families and shared their hopes and dreams.

Here stood a tall, gray edifice-the memorial at Umschlagplatz-and it listed popular Jewish names of the time. It was as though the name of each individual collectivity symbolized the unity and cohesion of the Jewish people.

Oddly, my eyes, as if assisted by the flow of names themselves, drew me to one name in particular over in the corner of the memorial that seemed to overshadow those around it. I allowed myself to be drawn closer. "Moshe." It seemed to have called my name out loud, though only I could hear it.

The name Moshe kept repeating itself along the memorial. It grew louder and stronger, like a ringing in the ear or a song stuck in the head. It followed me. Surrounded me. Embraced me.

Admittedly, I had been searching for his name. But when I came to it, I had to do a double take. As I ran my fingers over the name, the cold stone, bitter to the touch, chilled me to the bone, as if a tiny fraction of his experience had somehow embedded itself within me. His name-our name-had suddenly become more meaningful than ever, as if staring at the letters allowed me to stare into a shared soul.

Listening to the names from the story of my grandparents was one experience, but seeing them, touching them and feeling them that day at Umschlagplatz was another. The relationship to my grandmother's and grandfather's stories, while different experiences, became hauntingly similar. It was the sheer hatred, the acts of genocide and confounding aggression of the Nazis that made the details negligible-a moot point; no degradation can ever be subject to comparison. And nobody's story should be ranked or analyzed beyond a certain point.

Honestly, I thought I had been prepped for the experience, properly educated, informed and aware of where I was going. But what had been presented on video screens, researched for reports and read in textbooks seemed so incredibly abstract from my experience. The media only portrayed part of the story.

The experience of being there offered a totally different perspective, engaging both the mind and body. It was bitterly cold and eerily beautiful; the ground covered in thick snow, each step had echoing a loud crunch. The trees, off in the distance, so beautifully decorated with icicles. The rolling hills, the wide-open fields. My grandmother had described the setting exactly, but oddly enough had outlined each detail a little too precisely. What a shame the landscape had to witness one of history's most terrifying and bitter human behaviors.

So what's in a name: An identity? Hopes? Dreams? A life? Sure, all of the above. But there was also defiance of the Nazi status quo. My grandfather was a survivor. My grandmother was a survivor. And so were my maternal grandparents survivors. My existence, my blood, is the result of their struggle.

Proudly, I stepped away from the Umschlagplatz memorial. But I continued to stare at the stone wall, imagining what it would have felt like just 60 years prior. And for once, I could finally relate. I could relate to their struggle, to other struggles and to today's struggles of genocide. It transcends the human spirit and evokes a certain wisdom that book scholars may never obtain.

It was that day, that moment, that I realized I had met my grandfather for the first time.