Justice Is Served; Death of Chike B. Spiegel.- "one of the last surviving combatants of the 1943 Warsaw ghetto uprising against the Nazis"

This morning on the way to work, I got a speeding ticket. One of those instances in which over the years a residential street has become a short cut, so the residents complain, and the city sends someone out to catch the sinful.

Since I'm somewhat to the left of Kafka in my views of the constabulary. I left early at lunch to pay the fine.

To pay such, you have to go downdown to a batch of civic buildings - police headquarters, court houses, jails. Everything appears to flow together into one large administrative blob on the map.

I circled up and down and around several times before finding a spot on the street next to the official "Court Jurors and Employees" parking lot. A lot that appeared to be part pavement and part gravel.

As I walked toward police headquarters, I noticed how eerierly deserted the narrow street was. Not a pedestrian or moving vehicle did I see in my four blocks. And the only sound I heard was the white-noise whine of air conditioners.

All the small buildings were either lawyers offices or bail services. And all the big buildings were for the pursuit and administration of justice.

Once upon a time, each governmental function may have been housed in a single unit. But now, each location has mutated into a sprawling maze of wings, annexes and extensions. Connected by alleys and external stairs.

At last I noticed a small sign almost hidden by a bush that said, "Traffic Tickets." I followed the battered sidewalk into an entrance with a metal detector manned by two people behind a scarred wooden table. One asked to see a photo id and then said I needed to sign in.

The ticket office was only a few feet away around a corner. In a tiny space, I'd guess 8 x 15, five women were working at computers. Each person was no more than a few feet from her co-worker. It immediately struck me that the prisoners upstairs probably had more room. I asked if they felt cramped. One replied it would be ok, if they had some air.

No doubt, there are thousands of such offices across the world. Each with its set of anonymous workers toiling away.

In November of the prior year, she was herded onto a train bound for Treblinka but managed to breakout of a cattle car and escape back to the ghetto.

After the uprising, she managed to escape to the forests outside Warsaw and harass the Germans until the end of the war.

I had no idea that anyone had escaped the uprising. Nor did I realize that anyone was able to escape the death trains.

What an incredible life!

PAX!