on the street without fear that you’ll be smacked in the face [6] for bowing
incorrectly. You can peacefully sit at the table at home without fear that
guests armed with revolvers will pay you a visit [. . .] you [can] go to bed with
a good chance that the night will pass without any surprises. But the most
curious thing is that they buy in Jewish shops and pay the full price!” He was
right. After only several days I was ready to regard my experiences from
Aleksandrów Kujawski as a bad dream. But our stay in that paradise did not
last long, approximately 15 days. Within those two weeks the question Reich
oder Generalgouvernement?⁷¹⁷ was settled somewhere oben.⁷¹⁸ In the end Kutno
was incorporated into the Reich. Therefore, anticipating (and rightly so) that
the situation would come to resemble the one in Aleksandrów Kujawski, we
left the town one night in rather bad weather. We crossed the newly established
border under cover of darkness and we arrived in Łowicz.⁷¹⁹
Before I begin to describe our experiences in Łowicz, I would like to
honestly warn you that I will not even try to be objective. My memories connected
with that town are too upsetting and my memories of the Łowicz
inhabitants too unpleasant to delude myself that I could be objective, despite
my best intentions.
When the first larger transports of deportees arrived in the town, the
cunning Łowicz inhabitants realised that it was a perfect opportunity to take
advantage of those economic conditions. It was particularly apparent when it
came to rent. The rent for a room reached the exorbitant price of 40–60 zlotys
per month (previously it had been possible to rent a two-room flat for
approximately 30 zlotys per quarter). Another such symptom was the phenomenon
of the doubling or dividing of prices, previously unknown in economics.
Each product in a Jewish shop (I stress that I will write about Jews
only) had two prices: the regular one for the locals and the much higher one
for aliens, with ‘aliens’ being how the Łowicz inhabitants referred to us.
This division into ‘locals’ and ‘aliens’ persisted throughout all the tragedies
that befell the Łowicz Jewry. [. . .] the ‘locals’ who were in power [. . .] harassment
— mild as they were — against the ‘aliens’ [. . .] Mrs Jakubowska
717 (German) the Reich or the General Government? The incorporation of some of the Polish territories into the Third Reich resulted from Hitler’s decree of 8 October 1939.
718 (German) above, up there.
719 For more on Łowicz, see also Doc. 62.
