LIFE IN BAVARIA

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26792, 8 June 1948, Page 4

LIFE IN BAVARIA

HARDSHIP OF DISPLACED PERSONS MANY SERIOUS SHORTAGES The hardships of life in Bavaria, where hundreds of thousands of displaced persons are eking out a miserable existence are graphically described by one of these exiles in a letter handed to the Daily Times. The writer appeals to those who can help to do so by sending individual parcels. The correspondent is one of six people living in a hut with a floor area of 65 square feet. It is impossible for more than one person to dress at a time so, when the bell rings at 6 a.m., the housewife first rises and is followed by the others in succession. Breakfast consists of a cup of coffee without milk or sugar and a small ration of bread, carefully cut to ensure equal distribution. When the workers have set out for their places of employment the housewife faces the daily problem of ensuring that everyone gets enough to eat for dinner and supper. Each of these meals consists of a single dish only, without fat or meat and with potatoes only occasionally. _ Often _ only porridge made of bruised grain is eaten. There is no jam or fruit, and only sometimes milk. After the day’s work each member of the household sets out to look for fuel which is extremely hard to come by. There is practically no coal for domestic purposes and cooking is done with any wood which can be found in the countryside. The next problem is washing. Soap is too precious to be used for this purpose, and the workers usually clean their hands with sand. The soap ration is a small tablet of inferior quality which has to last each person for eight weeks. The family finally settles down for the evening, sometimes with electric light, if they, possess a globe, sdmetimes in the dark round the meagre fire. The writer adds that displaced persons are the poorest people in Germany to-day, having lost all their property and personal goods. “We have lost everything by duress and have been transported from our native Czechoslovakia by an action of terror and inhumanity,’* he states. He asks that personal parcels of food, soap and clothes be sent by any who can spate them. The address of the writer is: Rudolph Glaser. 37 Weigjnannstrassem (13a) Lauf O/Pegnitz, Bavaria.