Interview
EŁ:And those buildings next to ours, this
Wrocław. When you were moving in,
one and the small one laid crosswise,
were there any signs of war damage
were built simultaneously and had some
inside?
sort of social function. (pointing)
EŁ: No, there weren't any, somewhere
EŁ: Yes. And small chimneys were
a bullet penetrated an apartment, that's all.
everywhere... GHL: You've lived here since the 50s. GHL: Even after the war? What were
In the 70s the building became listed.
those?
Did you know at the time that it had
enter the gate. So cars couldn't drive
EŁ: No, they were everywhere before the
been registered as a monument?
in here, there weren't any of them around
war. Later on, when people were fixing
EŁ: No, we didn't know a thing, the
at the time anyway.
the roof, they built them on and there's
apartments were allotted by the City and
SS: There was more greenery and it was
no sign of them now. These were small
everybody just moved in.
all well-kept...
chimneys going out of the wall, some
EŁ: There were trees around like birch
kind of vents. There was central heating
and other large trees, but our former
here.
Ms Jagoda Lotz, a student, is renting an apartment at 2 Tramwajowa Street.
caretaker didn't like them, so she had them removed. We didn't do any major
GHL: Some sort of flue?
changes. We brought some soil to level
EŁ: Yes, there's still one in my apartment.
off the ground level a bit. There were
GHL: Ms Jagoda, you are a student of GHL: Can you still find a similar hole in
the Faculty of Architecture and have
your basement?
lived here for three years. What is it
GHL: When you were allocated an
EŁ: In the wall, it was used by former
like to live here?
apartment here, did you know anything
tenants during the war to heat the
JL: What is it like... well, it all started
about the building? In the 50s it was
apartments since the central heating was
when I was renting a small room in
pretty much different from the norm.
off. And in the basements were piles of
apartment 18 with my sister: four
EŁ: No, we only knew that Germans lived
fuse powder. Guns were laid out on the
students lived there. We didn't know one
here before the war. And there, where the
sills in the basement. Later on we threw
another when we were moving in, we
construction site is, was a kindergarten.
this powder out into the refuse behind
had separate rooms, but it was really
It wasn't a German kindergarten, but
the house. There was enough that if
nice because we would always meet the
a venue for the Hitler Youth.
someone had thrown a lit cigarette on it...
landlady or each other on the balcony
we didn't realise what a danger it was.
to talk or to party. We've become very
some holes and unevenness.
close to our neighbours. There are a lot of
GHL: Well, it was built as a kindergarten, and later on, in Hitler’s times, it was
GHL: The building wasn’t subject to
elderly people and you can chat to them.
assigned to the Hitler Youth.
any major damage during the siege of
They took us into their community.
28 WuWA