Janina and her Mother used to buy a baigel fro...

Janina and her Mother used to buy a baigel from time to time. But eating in the street was becoming impossible, while there were so many hungry eyes burning on every side with there thin arms stretched out beggging for money.
There were many beggars on the streets. Janina used to recognize some of them. At first they stood proudly against the wall, with their hands in pockets - they looked as if they had only stopped there for a moment. When time passed their pose would change and they would start plucking at the sleeves of passers-by and whispering some of their requests and already offering apologies.
Than the next stage would come nad they would sit on the pavement with a mask of stupor. From then the progress was very swift. They would either become thinner, like skeletons or their body would swell and cover in huge blisters. Then they would die and people would step over their bodies, covered with papers.

At the age of nine Janina David was leading a sheltered life with her prosperous Jewish family in Poland. One year later they were all facing starvation in the Warsaw ghetto.
In the memoirs of wartime childhood Janina David describes the family's struggle against insurmountable odds. When it becomes clear that none of them was likely to survive, the thirteen-year old girl was smuggled out of the ghetto to live with family friends - a Polish woman and her German - born husband. When their home becomes too dangerous, she was sent with false identity papers to a Catholic convent, where she lived in constant fear of being discovered.