have been given, are feeding the hungry children at a time when starvation
is lurking from all corners. Nourishing children in times of hunger is almost a mission!
Full of enthusiasm and joy, I started making new plans for work. Relieved from the Points on Zimna Street, I started to gather children from Nowolipki, Pawia, and Zamenhofa streets at the distribution Point at Zamenhofa Street 6. After breakfast I took children to the yard assigned to me by CENTOS (the half-day camp programme hadn’t officially started yet, and there was no equipment on the yard), where I tried to entertain them and give them some rest. At first, the children were listless and sluggish; they did not want to move or play at all (not to mention work), but only warmed themselves in the sun. After a couple of days they started to move around a bit, play, cleaned the square; they felt good.
At the same time, I was given the opportunity to take care of the sanitary condition of the children, which was lamentable. After all, the orders of the sanitary authorities were never followed, because why would they be? The hygienist cannot make them do anything, anyway. It is different with the care worker, who gives you food, and you have to listen to her.
A loaf of bread is an authority! Thanks to such prestige, I was able to encourage children to wash themselves and bathe regularly throughout the summer.
Unfortunately, however, my work at the half-day camp was for nothing. On 2 July I received an order from the Department: “Include 24 children from Lubeckiego Street 12 in the feeding programme.” How do I do that? Lubeckiego Street 12 is quite far from Zamenhofa Street 6. The condition of children from Lubeckiego Street 12 – terrible: two are lying on a heap of rags, they do not move, they relieve themselves there, they are no longer children, they are human husks; the third is lying in the street, in the gutter, cannot walk; there is no other way, I have to go down to the street and feed the child. These children cannot be dragged to Zamenhofa Street 6, to the distribution Point, I have to come to them, but what about the half-day camp programme? I have to give it up. I kept asking the Department to release me from Lubeckiego Street 12, so that I could run the half-day camp, and I kept receiving the same answer: “There’s no way, typhus, the care workers are sick, there’s no one to substitute for you. As soon as the sick come back, you will be relieved from Lubeckiego, but for the time being you must give up the
