Simon Kalmas - May 25, 1982
Smuggling and Resistance in Ghetto
In your, in your, in your ghettoes, was there any smuggling?
Yes, yes, yes there was smuggling, of course. People that knew the vicinity, you know, for smuggling, they did. I didn't have to smuggle in my city because I had a permit to go in and out. But when, when I came to the other ghetto in Neustadt, then my smuggling wasn't do any good because I didn't know anybody to go out and, and smuggle around, you know, uh, to hock this, you know, for something else. Things like that, so...
Was there any type of resistance?
In our place we couldn't have any resistance. First of all, you weren't safe--besides the Germans weren't safe from the Gentiles. There couldn't be any resistance because you couldn't even go any place that somewhere they wouldn't call a German, say "This is a Jude." They couldn't speak German, but they knew "Jude." This they knew to say. "This is Jude, Jude." You know. So in our place we couldn't, couldn't do a thing. Of course, Warsaw is something else. Other places--like my friend came back without a leg--he was in the Partisan. You know, the Partisan uh, in Russia. So uh, there, there was a resistance. This I could understand. They had the, the terrain. They had the cooperation from the surroundings, you know, it was--not, not in our place--wasn't our places.
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