While borders created restrictions, they also served as an excuse to reach beyond. Smuggling, one of the border-related phenomena, is a transfrontier phenomenon concerning the state, economy, and politics; it is a specific game between society and authority. Appearances notwithstanding, the Polish borders in the Polish People’s Republic were teeming with life, leading the inhabitants of border towns and central cities into economic temptation. Smuggling is a specific form of border-crossing with significant cultural consequences. Although the economy was the basis of these activities, they still created a network of social contacts and interests. The subject of considerations is an anthropological reverie into smuggling, crossing the border in Cieszyn Silesia between Poland and Czechoslovakia: a region that is a research laboratory for anthropologists. The author takes into account the industrial plants in this area, which were, according to research, the breeding ground for making contacts and creating interest groups that facilitated the efficient conduct of illegal activities. After 1989, the political breakthrough provided hope for a better life. Some have managed to transition from one system to another smoothly. One should emphasize that the memory of “smuggling years” is not a form of memory to be handed down from generation to generation. These memories are occasional, there is a slow eradication of information on this subject from memory, and silence leads to the gradual “disappearance” of knowledge about essential events or local personalities for whom smuggling was a significant source of income.