WARSAW TODAY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 4 July 1940, Page 6

WARSAW TODAY

COAL SELLING AT £8 A TON PESTILENCE AND POVERTY. TRADING IN THE CAFES. With 1,600 houses razed to the ground and 4.000 in ruins Warsaw is a tragic city, says a correspondent of “The Times,” London. The lively capital, beloved 12 months ago by all visitors for its excellent food, its elegant restaurants and cafes, its wide clean streets, its handsome palaces and churches, has suddenly aged and become a town of. ill-clad and starving people, pestilence and hopeless poverty. With a ton of coal costing nearly £B, the main problem during the severe winter has been heating. Coal in ordinary quantities was unobtainable and people had to buy small buckets of it after standing for hours in long queues. Houses with central heating suffered most because they were left to their own fate, while their inhabitants had to content themselves with inefficient electrical stoves or oil lamps. The only places where the much-tried Varsovian could warm himself was a cafe, packed usually to capacity, where he could get imitation tea or corn-co (fee and perhaps a cake. In the absence of wireless sets, which were ruthlessly confiscated, and with the Press rigidly controlled, these cafes became the only clearing-houses of information. Contrary to expectations, they have increased in number, as they provide one of the few legitimate means of making a living for those who happen to have a stock of tea or coffee, sugar and flour. Celebrated actors, journalists and professional men serve in them as waiters, and everyone is welcome, even if he does not order anything. If you want to know what is going on, who is dead or alive, or where to buy coal, potatoes, cigarettes or if you want to sell an overcoat for another, you walk into the nearest cafe. But this newly-found "trade” is not confined to cafes —it spreads to all streets and squares, in spite of rigid German regulations that no one should peddle foodstuffs. With shops, big and small, gradually emptying, and closing down on account of the impossibility of obtaining fresh supplies, the number of street peddlers, hawkers, and salesmen, professional and amateur, has increased by leaps and bounds. Almost everyone with any kind of means goes into this business; shoe laces may be exchanged for tinned goods, a hat for a packet of bacon, and so on.

Another great Warsaw problem is transport. All taxis and private cars were destroyed during the campaign, and only a few tram and 'bus lines are in operation, so that the inhabitant of Warsaw has become a champion walker. A handful of horse-driven droshkies and peasant carts serve as the only means of passenger transport in a town which once prided itself on its smart motor-cars.

Thousands of educated and professional men, and Government and municipal employees, artists, writers, engineers and school teachers have been at one stroke deprived of all chance of making a living. Most factories have reduced their staffs by 80 or 90 per cent. If there is a possibility of re-starting a factory it usually leaks out that the Germans have commandeered or dismantled the machinery. No day passes without the complete disappearance from shops and bazaars of some material or stock of goods. Toilet soap is practically unobtainable, while ordinary, soap costs 3s a lb. Prices are soaring with frightening rapidity, and even when available such commodities as shoes and clothes have ceased to be within the means of ordinary people. Deprived of coal. Poles during the winter had to sleep and work in their coats, which are therefore wearing out more quickly. The process of removing the traces of damages done by the bombardment has already begun. Houses which threaten to collapse are being pulled down, but the builders take good care that no good bricks or beams are wasted. The Germans have given strict orders to remove from the city squares and greens all haphazard graves dug during the bombardment. At one time there was hardly an open place without its impromptu cemetery. and often the typical Warsawhouse courtyards were used for this sad purpose. The Germans have ordered the collection of all metal parts, which are carefully stored and exported to Germany. Water, gas and electrical plants are gradually being restored, but it will lake many months before they are in good order. Only the privileged can now enjoy gas stoves or electric light. Warsaw needs no black-out.