Departure to the mine for the first shift began at 6:30, after a head count was done by police at the camp’s exit gate, somewhere next to the sleeping area, where prisoners would line up, often irregularly, and meandered down to the mine areas where their brigade was assigned.Brigades were divided according to the intake of camp prisoners.In certain periods during Spaç Camp’s operation, there were 50 prisoners per brigades; sometimes the number would reach 65 prisoners.They would follow the path to the tunnel’s entrance where they were assigned.

In rare cases when there was little time before the evening, prisoners spent their time with conversations, simple games, hidden readings, and foreign language learning in secret.  Foreign language learning was prohibited by the camp’s command. This accusation was frequently collected by depositions of spies who had infiltrated in the sleeping rooms and were often used as evidence to re-convict prisoners.

Showers were in front of toilets.Mainly in the first years, but also in the later stages, there was no hot water in the camp and the showers only brought the mountain’s icy water.Prisoners mainly washed with water, which they warmed themselves in metal tubs in the private kitchens.They then washed with the warmed water by pouring it on their bodies themselves with whatever vessel they had.Showers, like the toilets, were open and doorless.Prisoners were forced to wash in these conditions of utter lack of intimacy.

Meeting the rates was often impossible. Few prisoners could physically handle that titanic load at work.  In many cases during the cave-ins in the tunnel, there was not enough mineral to fill seven wagons. But prison command never accepted any justification for not meeting the rate. The most common expression of officers in Spaç was “Either your plan (target) or your soul”, which implied that death awaited all those who didn’t give the regime whatever was required at all costs.

In Spaç, there was poor quality food with no standards whatsoever.According to archival records and several testimonies collected among former prisoners, the food diet has changed frequently.Most of the time of its operation, however, daily quotas for prisoners working in Spaç’s mines were these:900 grams of bread per day.Breakfast included soup with seasonal vegetables, and sometimes a little meat.  Lunch was soup and a ladleful of pasta or rice with some meat.The standard was 40 grams of meat, but they were almost never provided with as much.Dinner was tea and 20 grams of feta cheese or, if there was no feta, 10 grams of typical yellow cheese and, in times of crisis, apple or fig marmalade.The first shift had the most normal food diet, whereas the two other shifts had tea for breakfast, soup for lunch and soup and rice or pasta for dinner.  This was adapted to their times of leaving for work and returning to the camp.Some archival documents, as well as many testimonies of former prisoners, record frequent food poisonings of prisoners.In a report dated 27th August 1979, prison command had complained for the poisoning of 150 prisoners.The most common symptoms were stomachaches and nausea.