see that they were either feeling alien or that something was bothering them.
That was how I reached the Eastern Railway Station. The station was blacked
out, even the tunnels. There was no information. I found out from the porter
from which platform the train was leaving. I saw a number of soldiers and
uniformed Germans from various [11] formations and organisations.
The train arrived three hours late. I entered a totally dark compartment
and I sat by the window with my right arm to the carriage wall. I carefully
took out the armband and pulled it over my sleeve. Two gentlemen sat
down in front of me. With coats over their right arms, they whispered to
each other. I saw immediately that they were Jews, too. A few other people
sat in the compartment. The two gentlemen asked about our location. They
found out that the train had just pulled out of the station where they wanted
to get off. They ran out into the corridor, when one of the other passengers
pointed out that they were Jews with covered armbands. When those gentlemen
wanted to return to the compartment, the other passengers would
not allow it. An anti-Semitic conversation began. One of the passengers,
a labourer, said that he had been in the ghetto. He described [12] with total
objectivity how shocking it was for him to see people dying on the street. But
due to the anti-Semitic atmosphere displayed in the compartment, he kept
saying that he did not pity the Jews at all.
That was how I reached Kraków, where I was to wait two hours for the
train to Tarnów. I stepped out and went into the waiting room. When I was
about to return to the platform, I showed my ticket to the German porter.
He stopped me, called a German from the Bahnpolizei,⁴⁹ and told him to collect
a six zloty fine from me for my failure to show the pass. I took out my pass
to show it to him, but it was too late. The policeman escorted me to the railway
police station, where I tried to explain [the matter] to an elderly German
(we were alone), but he told me that he must collect the fine. [13] Sie verstehen
in welchen Zeiten wir leben,⁵⁰ he added.
The crowding was so bad that I had great difficulty in boarding the train
bound for Tarnów. I need to point out that I could see many more Jewish
travellers than in Congress Poland. It was conspicuous. My pass allowed me
to travel to the town of Dębica, but I decided to make a stop in Tarnów. I was
49 (German) railway police.
50 (German) You understand in what times we are living.
