Wanderings: A Journey to Connect

Nikila Cole
Force Four Productions
50 minutes • 2001
Also available on DVD

A Canadian mother and daughter travel the 4,000-year-old Jewish diaspora to continents and countries as diverse as Southeast Asia, Iceland, Spain, Holland, the Caribbean, and India in search of connection to heritage, culture, and…each other. As the documentary opens, Sarah Cole finds the whole idea of travelling with her mother and interviewing Jews in various communities, highly distasteful and the epitome of "uncool." However, during the course of the film and their journey around the world, mother and daughter undergo a major transformation as they find the key to an unknown past and a loving connection to each other.

For thousand of years, the Jewish people have been dispersed throughout the world, sometimes by their choosing, many times not. Wanderings reaches into the essence of what has allowed these people to survive, which aspects of their history and traditions have been cherished and maintained, what has been let go, and what has been adapted.

Subject(s): Family, History, Intercultural studies, Jewish culture, World cultures