being arrested by the border guards was not yet over. The mood was cheerful. Going through the villages, we saw red flags on some of the buildings, and the houses were decorated with pictures of Soviet leaders and various posters. We felt a tremor of joy upon seeing Red Army soldiers, and their singing sounded strange after the weeks we had lived through in Warsaw. The uniforms of the Soviet troops and their pointed caps were, from the aesthetic point of view, backward compared to uniforms on the other side of the Bug, but that did notrestrain our joy. We felt that a new world had opened up for us, which held in its bosom boundless opportunities. At the Siemiatycze station, disappointment awaited us: we didn’t find our brother-in-law. The small station was besieged by thousands of people. In front of the ticket office there was a queue, and not much order. When I finally had the good fortune to hold a ticket in my hand, I learned that the train would not be leaving until the evening. For a wholeday (from [15] 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.) we stood on our feet, crammed together. But in the carriage, we were rewarded for our troubles at the station. Young people sang, jokes were told about life under the Germans. Clearly, people were relaxing after a long period of tension and needed to release all their pent-up energy and lust for life. The entry of a female conductor heightened the cheerful mood even further. She was assailed with questions, and people began to chat gaily and joke with her as if she were everyone’s best friend. We got off in Czeremcha232 and waited all night for a train to Brześć.
The big railway station looked like a besieged fortress. It was impossi-ble to push through the sea of people and find somewhere to stand, while one could not dream of a place to lay one’s head. There was a queue at the bar, where they seemed to be selling boiled water. The crush was dangerous, but in a few minutes there was no water even left. Our reserves of strength were running out, but we were sustained by the knowledge that we had broken through every barrier and were in the Soviet Union at last.
The first stage: Brześć233
The great majority of the refugees were heading for Białystok. Whole legendscirculated about Białystok. It was said that in Białystok fabulous sums were
