Marcela Droblas: A Life Remembered
Marcela Droblas was the eldest of three siblings. She was cheerful, positive, and loved to sing. She was always the life of the party, sharing her latest news and sparking conversations that brought together family and friends.
Marcela was sociable and outgoing. She thrived in all areas of her life, from public elementary school to the AMIA Hebrew Seminary, where she made lifelong friends through her shared love of Israel.
Although Macabi, the sports club she attended, was not explicitly Zionist, Marcela and her teenage friends felt a deep connection to what was happening in both Argentina and Israel. At the age of 18, Marcela enrolled in Rambam, a Zionist youth movement. After graduating from high school, she gathered her courage and made aliyah, immigrating to Israel with a friend. They lived together while attending university, where Marcela studied education and perfected her Hebrew. However, she eventually began to miss her family and friends and decided to return to Argentina.
Back in Argentina, Marcela worked for a time as a morá de shirá, a Hebrew music teacher at a Jewish school. She had a natural talent for music and was proficient at playing the guitar, despite never having taken formal lessons.
In 1990, Marcela joined the Israeli Embassy. She quickly made friends with the wives of the diplomats and the younger employees. As a person with great initiative, she proposed the creation of a choir, which met twice a week to rehearse. The ambassador had a deep affection for her, as did his children, whom Marcela would occasionally babysit when they were visiting the embassy.
Marcela was not materialistic. She was selfless, generous, and always willing to help others. When a severe flood left thousands of people homeless, Marcela went to the provincial government building with bags full of clothes from her own closet.
She was an idealist and an altruist who always saw the best in people. Curiously, she was not one to make plans for the future. She lived in the present moment, as if she knew that making plans was for others, not for her.
The attack took her away in the prime of her life, but her deep and lasting impact lives on in everyone who knew and loved her.