When Sami reached the age of six months my sister also came to Varna after graduating in chemistry. She started work in the factory in Devnya. At first she was on probation, but they liked her a lot and hired her on a permanent contract. She was accommodated in a hostel in Devnya. She used to visit us often in Varna. When she decided she spontaneously jumped on the train – we would eat together, she would see the child, we would talk and then she would go back to Devnya. Later she hired an attic room here in Varna. There was a common wash-room with a common lavatory. There was no bathroom. When Sami turned six the winter was very bad. We were afraid how our parents were going to live through it. My sister sheltered them in that small room. So that’s how three people used to live in those poor conditions for three years until my sister got a house from the factory. The house in Vidin had been left empty for two years until they decided they could no longer live there. They sold it in 1962 and in 1963 they settled down in Varna. My mother died in 1977 and my father – in 1979. They were buried according to the seven-day Jewish ritual, despite the fact there wasn’t a rabbi. The prayer must be read by the closest male inheritor. That turned out to be my son. All of them were buried in white bed-sheets in covered coffins. That’s how we buried my sister in 1992 and my husband in 2000, too. That’s how my father-in-law was buried in 1976 and my mother-in-law in 1988. In December 1977 my husband, Sami and I moved to a house of our own.
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Victoria Almalekh
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On 31st November 1957 I started working in the Workers’ Hospital in Varna, where I retired in 1986. For my forty-year length of service I have never been felt any anti-Semitic moods. Only once a hospital attendant, who was not a Bulgarian lady, but a Serbian one, called me ‘chifutka’ [28]. She had come with the Yugoslavian children between 1944 and 1950. So she came with those Yugoslavian children, got married and stayed. So this woman, who everybody used to call Mara-the-Serbian, called me ‘chifutka’. At that time the chief doctor of the hospital that I worked in was a Jew. His name was Hari Kaponov. I went to see him and I told him. He promised he was going to call her but he changed my opinion by saying: 'Nurse Almalekh, it is beneath your dignity to waste your time on Mara-the-Serbian.
My husband Yosif Samuil Almalekh was born in Varna in 1923. He was a marine officer – chief commander in politics (CCP). In December of 1955 he suffered the Geneva dismissal – the first dismissal in the army after 9th September. He was out of work and got hired as a manager of two of the hotels in the Druzhba resort [Some big and famous sea resorts built at that time – Drouzhba, Albena, Golden Sands, Varna, Sunny Beach]. He worked there for two years and a half. When Sami was a year and a half old – in other words the summer of 1957 – they set him up. They accused him of obstinately going to dinner with the ambassadors of Switzerland and Israel, who were guests at the hotel. In a week he was fired from Balkantourist [a state business enterprise established in 1948 with the main task to organize the international tourism in Bulgaria and the trips of Bulgarian citizens abroad] and expelled from the [communist] party. He was unemployed for thirteen months. At that time I hadn’t started working either. I was looking after my child. My husband didn’t earn anything because he was chased away, fired and expelled from work. I don’t know what to tell you – we went through a difficult period. At one point an acquaintance of my old father-in-law’s from the harbour found him a job in the cereals warehouses, which were across from the harbour. That’s how he started dealing with accounting as an economist. He changed a few places afterwards. He worked as an economist till the end of his length of service.
When I moved to my husband’s family there was already a big change in celebrating Jewish holidays. My mother-in-law used to go to Bet Am [27] for the holidays, but I think she was too lazy to celebrate at home. They had their excuse – they were communists. There was no place where you could buy kosher meat any more. My mother-in-law used to bring and eat pork. My parents never put pork in their mouths.
I got married on 29th April and on 1st February I gave birth to my son Sami – Samuil Yosif Almalekh. At the time when I was pregnant it wasn’t possible to see the sex of my future baby. I couldn’t imagine giving a birth to a girl and naming it after my mother-in-law. I had warned my husband: 'We have had a lot of wars in the family, but if you start a war about the fact that I won’t name my future child after your mother – this will be the last war.' Thank Goodness it was a boy. It was clear that he would be named after my father-in-law and I didn’t mind. We had to do his brit on the eighth day. It could be done only in Sofia in those days. My mother-in-law raised hell again. She thought it wasn’t necessary to do the brit: 'Who does a brit nowadays? Where are we going to find money to call a mohel from Sofia?' Then I told her: 'This child is your first grandson and has your husband’s name. You accepted me as a Jewish woman in this house. I came to you to find a Jewish family. I took a circumcised Jewish man for a husband. How much money have you made for your life? It’s less than 20 stotinkas [0.2 leva]. So you will not talk about money. Your son who has a son and has become a father has his responsibilities. He will find a way.'
We didn’t do the brit on the eighth day, because the baby got ill. I also left the maternity hospital with a lot of complications. We did it on the thirthieth day. It was performed in our home in the presence of a mohel from Sofia, whose name I can’t remember. He arrived in the morning on the day of the brit and left in the afternoon, because otherwise he had to spend the night at home and there was no space. They counted on me as a nurse to take care of the baby’s wound. David Levi and his wife Dora (a professional obstetrician, who used to look after me through the entire period of pregnancy besides the consultations) became a sandak and a sandaka. A sandak is a man chosen by the family who has to hold the baby during his circumcision. A sandaka is his wife. She has to take the baby from the mother’s arms, to take him to the place of the circumcision and deliver him to the arms of the mohel who accomplishes the act of circumcision. It’s the act of uniting with God. After the brit the sandaka takes the baby once again and delivers him in his mother’s arms. My father-in-law and my mother-in-law were present at the brit as well. My father-in-law announced the baby’s name to the mohel. They had placed some gauze with some cotton soaked in wine in the baby’s mouth so he couldn’t feel pain during the circumcision. I had run away to the end of a large balcony at the end of that floor so I wouldn’t listen to the baby’s cry. It was March and spring was coming. Seagulls had started showing up. Some were flying and croaking above the balcony and I felt like that was the baby’s cry. This twenty-minute period felt like it’s never-ending. I don’t know how I didn’t go berserk. After that they called me when they removed the wine from his mouth. I was almost unconscious. I took the baby to my breast immediately and he threw up his mother’s milk. I didn’t take into consideration he was full of wine. I should have left him throw up the wine first.
We didn’t do the brit on the eighth day, because the baby got ill. I also left the maternity hospital with a lot of complications. We did it on the thirthieth day. It was performed in our home in the presence of a mohel from Sofia, whose name I can’t remember. He arrived in the morning on the day of the brit and left in the afternoon, because otherwise he had to spend the night at home and there was no space. They counted on me as a nurse to take care of the baby’s wound. David Levi and his wife Dora (a professional obstetrician, who used to look after me through the entire period of pregnancy besides the consultations) became a sandak and a sandaka. A sandak is a man chosen by the family who has to hold the baby during his circumcision. A sandaka is his wife. She has to take the baby from the mother’s arms, to take him to the place of the circumcision and deliver him to the arms of the mohel who accomplishes the act of circumcision. It’s the act of uniting with God. After the brit the sandaka takes the baby once again and delivers him in his mother’s arms. My father-in-law and my mother-in-law were present at the brit as well. My father-in-law announced the baby’s name to the mohel. They had placed some gauze with some cotton soaked in wine in the baby’s mouth so he couldn’t feel pain during the circumcision. I had run away to the end of a large balcony at the end of that floor so I wouldn’t listen to the baby’s cry. It was March and spring was coming. Seagulls had started showing up. Some were flying and croaking above the balcony and I felt like that was the baby’s cry. This twenty-minute period felt like it’s never-ending. I don’t know how I didn’t go berserk. After that they called me when they removed the wine from his mouth. I was almost unconscious. I took the baby to my breast immediately and he threw up his mother’s milk. I didn’t take into consideration he was full of wine. I should have left him throw up the wine first.
We met on 10th March – my birthday in 1955. On 29th April we got engaged in Sofia in the presence of relatives of his and mine. Our wedding was in Varna – my husband’s home town. We were married only before the registrar with no ketubbah, no Ashugar and no Ravni. In those days my parents used to live in Vidin. They came a day before and spent the night at their in-laws’ apartment. The same night my mother-in-law made a grand scandal, a real hell for me, for reasons I don’t want to relate now. That day was really indicative as from then on our living together passed under the banner of scandal. This continued for 23 years - this was the time during which my husband, my son and I lived together with my parents-in-law. It ended when my husband and I could afford a house of our own and started living separately due to my firm insistence.
My sister used to be a beauty too. My matchmakers (if I have to be more specific – Albert Koen’s wife Berta) decided to hide her. She asked her not to show up while we were on our first date. 'We settled this job for your sister. When you become of age we’ll think of you as well.' She was a second year student at that time. When I understood I got angry and decided they shouldn’t hide my sister. I remember the only things we had on the table on our first date were some pounded up walnuts and some peanuts. On the table we were with Albert and Berta Koen, my husband’s uncle and aunt – Yona and Bucha Adzhiman, Yosif Almalekh (who they were dating me with) and a friend of his named Eliezer Moskovich. We were drinking lemonade. I was irritated because they had hidden my sister and without rhyme or reason I said 'I have a younger sister. I’m going to introduce her to you.' When I turned my back to call my sister my future husband told his friend 'What a nice ass.' I felt insulted. I don’t think his first comment about me should have been that. He was such an earthly and calm person.
Albert Koen’s family were friends with my husband’s aunt. They had seen me coming to visit my sister and they knew I was working in Pirogov Hospital. They liked me for their nephew and decided I was a good match for him. He was an officer in the Navy in Varna. They arranged me a date with him in the house where my sister lived. I had to take a night shift in the hospital the same night. I had to wash all the tools after the shift. I set up palette and opened all the windows for ventilation because it was March. I poured some spirits on the palette and scratched a match. At the same moment the door to the hall opened. There was a draught, the fire broke into flames and caught half of my blouse and my hair. So I lost some hair, my eyelashes and my eyebrows. Everything was singed. I went to meet my future husband like that. Despite the accident I had given a promise. The date was at 10 p.m.
My sister also became a student in Sofia in 1950. She used to live in lodgings while I was living in the boarding-house. Her place was on the corner of Georgi Kirkov St. and Bratya Miladinovi St. this was quite close to the Zhenski Pazar [Women’s Market]. Tram number 4 used to stop exactly opposite her place. In those days SofZhilFond [A shortened version of Sofia Housing Fund – a department in Sofia Municipality whose aim was to operate with the housing fund – the vacant flats and houses. After the nationalization of the covered urban real estate Sofzhilfond was responsible for accommodating the citizens of Sofia in different places for living. Later on, after 1960, the department started the building of new flats.] used to give rooms for rent. There were four more rooms on the floor where my sister lived. She lived in one of them. The chief of the post office at that time Albert Koen lived in another one. The daughter of aunt Sarina and uncle Leon lived in the third one with her Bulgarian husband. Three students shared the fourth one. I used to visit my sister quite often.
In 1948 all my relatives moved to Israel [25]. My father insisted on our remaining in Bulgaria. He was a real communist and thought he would participate in building the communist system. He thought that we, his children, were going to live in socialism. After 9th September I was a member of Hashomer Hatzair and my sister – of BCP [26], but I can’t say exactly since when.
After finishing high school in 1948 I went to Sofia to study in the Nurse School. I missed the admittance exams, but I went with my father to meet Racho Angelov – the first Minister of Health. He gave my father a piece of advice: 'There are two profiles – for obstetricians and for nurses, but the obstetricians are sent to villages immediately after they graduate.' He looked at me. I weighed only 40 kg. He continued: 'Your child is not for a village. You must get her to the Nurse School if you want her to work in the city.' In those days people were assigned which means that they were ordered by the authorities to settle down and start work in a place the authorities had chosen. So I became a student in the Nurse School with the Red Cross [24]. There I was on a state allowance along Red Cross lines. In other words I was on board and lodging. The place where today Pirogov Hospital is was the Hospital of the Red Cross I had a place to live in. Scraping a living was not a problem. It was the time of coupons. They used to take good care of us in the boarding-house, because of the support from the Red Cross. In other hostels there was tuberculosis. It was the years after the war and there was a coupon system. For instance, I had never eaten leeks with rice, but in those days we used to have such a meal in the free refectory. I used to have some bread with some salt and the leeks I used to give my food to the other girls. I couldn’t eat it. The second school for nurses was on the other side of the Russian Monument. Now it’s the hospital of the Ministry of Interior.
After graduation I was assigned to the Red Cross Hospital. It’s in the yard of the Pirogov Hospital. There was a three-storey building in there. If you were on tram number 5 you could see the operation rooms in the hospital. I had worked there for four complete years when suddenly, in the fifth year, some children from Korea arrived for training. This was during the Korea War. For those new needs a child-section was opened in the hospital. I started working there.
After graduation I was assigned to the Red Cross Hospital. It’s in the yard of the Pirogov Hospital. There was a three-storey building in there. If you were on tram number 5 you could see the operation rooms in the hospital. I had worked there for four complete years when suddenly, in the fifth year, some children from Korea arrived for training. This was during the Korea War. For those new needs a child-section was opened in the hospital. I started working there.
As I told you, from 1944 till 1948 I was in Hashomer Hatzair. It was horrible. There were no uniforms. We used to be twelve or fifteen children and we gathered together in the Jewish school. We used to study Ivrit. The goal of Hashomer Hatzair was to prepare for the life in Israel. The year was 1948.
After 9th September I went directly to high school. I don’t even want to remember how I got to draw level with my Bulgarian classmates. There were some really great people in the school. What did my teacher in Literature – Roza Popova and my teacher in Mathematics – Sevastitsa, whose family name I don’t remember - owe me? They both used to stay with me after classes only to help me catch up with my classmates. No one paid them extra. No one made them do so. Boys and girls used to be in separate high schools – a boys’ school and a girls’ school. There were thirty children in the class and six or seven out of them were Jewish. This was after 9th September. We all had caught up with our friends by the end of the first term. Our teachers had the good will to help us achieve that. If they had left us alone we wouldn’t have reached the same level as we did with them. That’s why I always say – I’ve had big luck twice in my life – I got lucky with parents and with teachers from the beginning to the end. I was lucky with the teachers even I started studying in the Nurse School.
My father’s store was taken away. [On 27th December 1947 in State Gazette was promulgated the Act for the Nationalization of the Industrial and Mining Enterprises according to which the state had to start the liquidation of the private sector. The next step was the promulgation of the Act for the Nationalization of the Banks again in December 1947. In the following year was accepted the Act for the Nationalization of the big, covered, urban real estate – with these acts started the establishment of socialist economics]. We had no financial funds. We had some stuff left from the hidden reserve. My parents adjusted the pram of their grown children and placed a door on it crosswise. So they went to the market with the pram with what was left from the shop. Besides the yarn and the textiles there were also some beads, some village ear-rings, some combs and sewing needles. After that they placed the stuff from the pram on the board as on a street-stall and started selling. In those postwar days people didn’t have anything. God forbid you learn what poverty is. I don’t wish you that. There was nothing. There was no sewing thread, for instance, but since no one had any money no one could buy a whole pack, if there was some for sale. There was enough money to buy a couple of needles only. We used to stick them two by two on a piece of cardboard. We used to unwind big skeins of thread and wind some on smaller skeins, so people could sew a button. Three or four years we lived thanks to that pram.
In the meantime trade developed. Obviously other people had also hidden some things. My father started going from Vidin to Sofia with a small briefcase for some stuff, because what we had hidden we sold for about a month. So the pram and its door used to feed us for four years this way.
After that came some years of prosperity. A carpenter told us he could make a covered stall for us and he made one. My parents placed it on the market. They were finally in the lee. And this was prosperity – there was a cover, there was a roof over their heads. Snow was no longer on them. They brought up me and my sister with that.
In the meantime trade developed. Obviously other people had also hidden some things. My father started going from Vidin to Sofia with a small briefcase for some stuff, because what we had hidden we sold for about a month. So the pram and its door used to feed us for four years this way.
After that came some years of prosperity. A carpenter told us he could make a covered stall for us and he made one. My parents placed it on the market. They were finally in the lee. And this was prosperity – there was a cover, there was a roof over their heads. Snow was no longer on them. They brought up me and my sister with that.
9th May came, but poverty didn’t end – postwar years. What do you think we used to wear for sandals? You would cut a 1.5 cm thick board into the shape of your foot. This board would be covered with leather. After the board was covered with leather you would put a leather strap on it. The strap would have been previously cut to be bendable. Each board would get a nail and there would be your sandal. That’s good, but the problem was that the wood was not good enough to hold the nails. So whenever I got to the end of a street the nails used to start giving me a stabbing pain. My feet aren’t big now, and in those days they were tiny. So I used to stop, bang the nails back with a rock or something and then continue my way to the high school. That’s good, but what about the rainy weather and all the mud. I didn’t have shoes and there was no place you could buy any. So, I used to put on a pair of old galoshes belonging to my mother. But a galosh has no collar – nothing. Snow easily comes in. You have to put them on with a pair of bootees on your feet. My regular trick was to stay in school with my wet feet in those galoshes. And only when I got home I would take them off. And during all that time we used to say 'We survived anyway.' That’s why I’m telling you there is a dividing line in my life – before and after the Holocaust.
The 9th September 1944 came. The Soviet army entered from Dobrich in the first days. They remained in Vidin for about a week after 9th September. My sister and I heard some big noise coming from the prison around noon, but there was no one to tell us what was going on. We were at home. In those days everybody used to wear pattens. There were no shoes – only pattens. So we put on our pattens and went to the prison at the moment when political prisons were being released. Their relatives had heard they were being released and went to meet them forming a line. People started singing songs. I can’t remember the songs, but one of them was in Russian. The line headed to the square for a rally. They took over the police-station, which, I told you, was on the square. We the children, fools that we were, followed the line of people to the square. They took the police chief out and different people started making speeches. We stayed there till 9 p.m. it was dark then and we went home. In the meantime mom had gone mad, because the last ones who saw us told her we went to the prison – two little girls. They already knew there was a rally on the square. How could they know we would be there wearing our pattens on our feet. Oh, boy, what happened when we got home? While I’m alive I will always remember what a spanking I got from my mother. She was beating mostly me, because I was the older one and I was responsible for Beka. She thought I was supposed to keep that in mind and not go there. So 9th September was the last time I got beaten.
9th September came – the war ended.
9th September came – the war ended.
My father was a communist. One day he headed through the wickets to a meeting-place to bring some clothes and bed-sheets. They were collecting some to use them as bandages. They had found a wounded partisan and he needed some clothes and bandages. Fortunately, they saw only the back of the man who went out with the stuff, but they caught my father anyway: 'Why were you talking to a Bulgarian in the evening? Come with us.' The police-station was downtown, some tough thrashing followed. Well, my father had been stammering since childhood anyway. Policemen couldn’t know he did. So he could barely talk. And because they couldn’t understand what he was saying they let him go. He only got some thrashing. He didn’t go to court and he didn’t go to jail.
There was another drama in our home: until the moment when people from Sofia moved to our house none of us had ever heard about bed-bugs. These families brought some luggage including some blankets, mattresses and some plank-beds and I don’t know what. So the entire house got full of bugs thanks to those old things. The house was old and all of the eaves, floors and sashes were wooden. Everything got full of bugs. Can you imagine when they were gone? You won’t believe it if I told you – in 1945 when the DDT appeared.
The war with the bugs was a real epopee. This used to be Egyptian labor because the only things that could make the bugs go away were fire and petroleum. We would take out everything. Our beds were with metal bed-springs and panels. We used to make petroleum-soaked pieces of wick and put them into the empty spaces of those beds and strings. We would set them on fire afterwards so the bugs were forced out. After they burned and burned we would spread some petroleum on the edges. It stank but you would be okay with it, because nothing would be biting. We had some rashes with pimples as big as lentils grains. We were just children and we couldn’t fall asleep. Despite this horrible menace we didn’t get into a conflict. That’s how Jewish people used to suffer. That’s why I’m saying I don’t have the right either to forget it or to stop telling the story about it while I’m alive. That was the suffering of the Jews. It was a great suffering, but it is over. The victims we gave were the political prisoners – no one else.
The war with the bugs was a real epopee. This used to be Egyptian labor because the only things that could make the bugs go away were fire and petroleum. We would take out everything. Our beds were with metal bed-springs and panels. We used to make petroleum-soaked pieces of wick and put them into the empty spaces of those beds and strings. We would set them on fire afterwards so the bugs were forced out. After they burned and burned we would spread some petroleum on the edges. It stank but you would be okay with it, because nothing would be biting. We had some rashes with pimples as big as lentils grains. We were just children and we couldn’t fall asleep. Despite this horrible menace we didn’t get into a conflict. That’s how Jewish people used to suffer. That’s why I’m saying I don’t have the right either to forget it or to stop telling the story about it while I’m alive. That was the suffering of the Jews. It was a great suffering, but it is over. The victims we gave were the political prisoners – no one else.
There wasn’t enough food for everybody. The time we could spend out of the house was restricted. You would not to be allowed to be out on the street at nine in the morning. We had some coupons for bread, but what could we use them for when we couldn’t reach the bakery. And what kind of bread we would eat. It had two crusts as dark-brown as this blouse. It was round and heavy with something like mud-pulp in the middle. And what would my mother do. She was really afraid not to make us ill. So she would take the two crusts – one for me and one for my sister, and split them for three meals. And then she would knead and roll the mud-pulp from the inside into some corn-flour. This she would cover with some newspaper and put into the oven. It couldn’t be baked, it was mud and it could only dry out. After that she would share it between grandma, father and herself. If a neighbor would bring some white flour she would make something for the children. And we would celebrate if somebody brought a handful of walnuts. They’re quite a nutritious kind of food. The amount was enough for dinner. When mom pounded them up they quenched our hunger. We would have two stoves burning during winter. One would be the cooker in the so called hall. The other one would be in grandma’s room.
When spring came each family used to take out a saucepan and a brazier in the yard. Do you know what are braziers made out of an old greased saucepan and three bolts, heated with some live coals or plain charcoal? Everybody from the community used to have one and if a child smelled your delicious cooking you would definitely let him have some. Even nowadays I wonder how came no conflicts occurred under those circumstances and we separated with love. I can’t say how this was possible.
When spring came each family used to take out a saucepan and a brazier in the yard. Do you know what are braziers made out of an old greased saucepan and three bolts, heated with some live coals or plain charcoal? Everybody from the community used to have one and if a child smelled your delicious cooking you would definitely let him have some. Even nowadays I wonder how came no conflicts occurred under those circumstances and we separated with love. I can’t say how this was possible.
The tragedy with the people interned to Vidin was probably a tragedy for all the Jews and the situation was very hard. There was too little space. Things got a little bit more organized after some time anyway. We had only one lavatory – in the yard. So we, the elder ones, started to get up at dawn. Afterwards one by one we all could go to the privy. Some night-pots were put in the corners for the little children. In the entrance-hall where we cooked we would put a brazier with more charcoal and every one of us would warm up some water in his own pot or cup before going to the bathroom to freshen up. Taking a bath was quite a story, because going to the Turkish baths was not that simple. That’s how it was – 'The Jewish hour' would come. But all of this is another story.
Let me tell you how we shared the living space. My father, my mother and her sister with her husband shared my mother’s bedroom. My parents weren’t that old. Probably they needed some privacy, but that’s how it was. One of my cousin’s children slept on the couch in front of my mother’s beds. The widow Redzhina, her two boys, my cousin’s older son and one of my aunt’s sons shared the hall. There wasn’t enough space in this big room for her other son so he had to sleep on a big wooden bench in the entrance-hall. A mobile board was added to the bench. It would be removed during the day but it used to make the bench wider during night. A mattress would be laid on it so my cousin could sleep on it. My cousin Rebeka slept with her husband in grandma’s room. My sister and I shared our room with granny. I don’t know what to say, all of us managed to live together.
Let me tell you how we shared the living space. My father, my mother and her sister with her husband shared my mother’s bedroom. My parents weren’t that old. Probably they needed some privacy, but that’s how it was. One of my cousin’s children slept on the couch in front of my mother’s beds. The widow Redzhina, her two boys, my cousin’s older son and one of my aunt’s sons shared the hall. There wasn’t enough space in this big room for her other son so he had to sleep on a big wooden bench in the entrance-hall. A mobile board was added to the bench. It would be removed during the day but it used to make the bench wider during night. A mattress would be laid on it so my cousin could sleep on it. My cousin Rebeka slept with her husband in grandma’s room. My sister and I shared our room with granny. I don’t know what to say, all of us managed to live together.
In the summer of 1943 the big family of aunt Soultana Koen and her husband Marko arrived after being interned from Sofia. They had four children – Adolf, Sason, Rebeka and Soloucha. Adolf arrived with his Bulgarian wife – Tsvetanka. Soloucha was alone and Rebeka brought her husband Albert Koen and her two children – Izi and Marsel. They all moved to our house. As if that wasn’t enough one fine day my mother met a woman with two children on her way back from the post-office. Her name was Redzhina Sidi. The woman asked my mother about the way to the Jewish school in the Jewish neighborhood. My mother showed some interest in the reason why this woman was asking about the Jewish school. She understood they were interned and would be accommodated in the Jewish school, because there was no room left in the private homes. When mom understood that the woman was a widow with two children she invited her home. And imagine how this house where the five of us lived accommodated all of the people listed above. We would also have to share the provisions which we were getting from the peasants with everybody living at home.
My father was too old to go to a labor camp [23], but they closed his shop. So not only a Jew wouldn’t have the right to work in his store, but on top of that they would take all the goods on stock, having before that visited the shop and put an inscription 'Jewish shop' on the store. Those were the moments when you would definitely feel different. We were deprived of the means to earn a living.
So they took the goods but my parents found a Bulgarian carter who was a friend of theirs. They loaded up as much stuff as they could hide in his cart and brought it home. In those years there were no plastic bags so they put the stuff in kegs and buried some in the ground… some went under the mattresses… others were put at the bottom of the wardrobes where a second board had been placed. This way it couldn’t be seen. Some people would come to check whether any stuff had been hidden. My mother would work during the night so they couldn’t see her, because she was not allowed to work. She would make men’s shirts and pants from unbleached calico and sheeting and in this way she earned some money. The only paint on sale in the shops was yellow. They would paint the shirts and pants yellow in the morning so they could sell them to the peasants. Peasants didn’t want to wear white. They would get to our house through the tiny doors leading to our neighbors’ yard, buy some of the stuff, made by my mother and bring back some provisions.
So they took the goods but my parents found a Bulgarian carter who was a friend of theirs. They loaded up as much stuff as they could hide in his cart and brought it home. In those years there were no plastic bags so they put the stuff in kegs and buried some in the ground… some went under the mattresses… others were put at the bottom of the wardrobes where a second board had been placed. This way it couldn’t be seen. Some people would come to check whether any stuff had been hidden. My mother would work during the night so they couldn’t see her, because she was not allowed to work. She would make men’s shirts and pants from unbleached calico and sheeting and in this way she earned some money. The only paint on sale in the shops was yellow. They would paint the shirts and pants yellow in the morning so they could sell them to the peasants. Peasants didn’t want to wear white. They would get to our house through the tiny doors leading to our neighbors’ yard, buy some of the stuff, made by my mother and bring back some provisions.
During fascism – in 1941 all the Jewish schools were closed. In 1942 I started studying in a Bulgarian junior high school. The big flood in Vidin from 1942 took place after my first year of my junior high education. The epidemics of scarlet fever occurred after that. It broke out all over Vidin. So school was closed firstly because of the flood, secondly because of the outburst, thirdly when the anti-Jewish laws [Law for the Protection of the Nation] [21] became effective and we no longer had the right to go to school. So I lost the third year in junior high. As a matter of fact until that moment I had never felt I was different. I felt the difference when we had to put on the yellow stars [22] during the Holocaust. This was in the beginning of 1943.
I think that the prime cause for all of the bad luck in life both for me and my family was fascism. It turned the lives of all the Jews upside-down. You can say it brought the condition for the assimilation. If fascism didn’t pass through our beautiful Bulgaria, which gave us a second life, would the Jews move from Bulgaria to Israel? None of those fifty thousand people that left could forget what happened. A lot of people stayed here. The social structure changed. All the consequences for mixed marriages and for the lack of such ones came from there, too. The years of forgotten traditions came. There is a sharp division – crucial time. I imagine it as, you know what happens, when a flood ends and after the water goes out… In my opinion, in my mind, all the negative things are due to fascism. Just think about it. In my life for 75 years there has been one war, two revolutions, fascism and the horror of it. Isn’t that too much for a single human life? It is impossible to be unaffected. And it’s not only about me, but about the entire Jewish community. It’s fixed in the subconscious and it can’t be deleted.
I keep in touch with the Jewish community; I am a member of Shalom [31] and WIZO. I go to the Jewish Home, which I really think of as my second home – Home of the people. Our community is small, but it’s full of life. This revival started about ten years ago. The point is that the population is going low. The ones who gather together are old people. The middle-aged generation (30 to 50 years olds) make separate meetings, because their interests are different from ours. All of them are members of most of the organizations. I got 500 German marks once and after that – 1000 dollars as compensations.
I am a leftist. In my eyes capitalism is a curse for humanity. On 10th November 1989 [29] I was on vacation in Hisar [resort] with some friends from Varna. We heard on the radio that Todor Zhivkov [30] was ousted. I said my supposition in front of everybody that that probably was our last time together in Hisar. No one believed me then but that’s what really happened. After 10th November my life changed completely. We got poor. I retired in 1986 after forty years of service and my pension was 141.90 BGN [around 70 EUR]. Today my pension with the widow-extra is 135.30 BGN. For twenty years I have never reached my first pension at these standards. No one can live like that. I’m pretty sure that (God forbid) such a regime should definitely lead to revolutionary changes; if these changes should be called European Union it is going to be a change. This can’t continue for too long. There is no way.
After my sister’s death in 1992 I lost 17 kilos. My hands started shaking. I used to have that crazy insomnia, because a looked after her till her last breath. After her death I was driven to a sanatorium and burglars broke into her house and took whatever they could. Before it was a year after my sister’s death some relatives of mine went back to Israel. They were here for the summer. They told my son about my condition. He came back to Bulgaria. He found a pile of medications on the table and he understood this was not going to work like that. He spent one more year in Israel so he could repay the subsidies he had been given at the beginning and he came back to Bulgaria. He had worked only for ten months of his three years’ stay there. Now Sami works for a construction company in Varna. We live together because my age doesn’t allow us to keep two apartments and two households.
So when in 1990, on New Year’s Eve, my son rushed to go and live in Israel I wrote him a letter and I left it in the outside pocket of one of his bags: 'You should always keep in mind that our street door will always have a green light. You can always enter, come back and stay.' And I left him keys for home in the pocket. Let him always keep in mind that he can always come back. By the law as a new emigrant he had the right to get six-month training in Ulpan provided by the country. After that he was to get a job. Yes, but there were jobs in construction only in theory. When they said a construction technician they thought that he should go to the construction site, grab the wheel-barrow and start building. They didn’t need managers in technology. I don’t know what the situation now is but at that time those highly-eduacted men replaced their seasonal Arab workers. He left home in December and on the next 1st March I was already there. I stayed in March and April. I just stood there these two months and observed. At this time my son told me how many jobs he had changed and all of them were the least prestigious possible. At the end of the aliyah they hired him as a head-technician and he worked for six months, but he didn’t get a worker to pound the border pegs and he had to do it himself. The night after this work-day his knee was already full of water, because he had a disease. He took three days off to get some injections so he could walk. On the fourth day he showed up at work and they told him: 'Go home! We don’t need any sick people!
I used to have some relatives in Israel. My first real contacts with them started in 1961. Till that moment we couldn’t write letters, because my husband was an officer and our correspondence was always checked. In 1965 was the first time when I went to Israel despite the fact I wasn’t keen on going. They refused to give a permission to my husband three times, because he was an ex-officer. One day he boiled over. He was quite a patient person but when things went beyond all tolerable boundaries he would fall into a fit of rage. He went to the militia and said 'All right you won’t let me go. Will you let my wife and my child to?', 'We will.' He immediately wrote an application without thinking how much money we have and, on top of that, some time passed before his coming home and he forgot to tell us.
After some time there came a message saying that Sami and I were permitted to go. At that time my son was nine years old. I didn’t want to go without my sister. She also managed to get the necessary papers and we went on a ship after some very short preparations. At the moment the ship was out of Galata [a suburb of Varna by the sea] we all got seasick. Only my sister could go to bring some water. So until reaching the harbor in Haifa we hadn’t got out of the cots. It was the same and even worse on our way back. It was so bad that my husband had to get on the ship to take Sami out in his arms. He was so seasick he couldn’t get out of the ship. In Israel they told us that a fellow-student of my sister’s went to see her relatives in Israel and stayed there, because she didn’t want to go through the seasick horror once more. I met all of my relatives. I hadn’t seen them for seventeen years. They were very happy. There was a cousin of mine living in a kibbutz –Vida Pinkas and I spent ten days with her, Sami and her child. We were surrounded with so much care. They would organize walks and trips. They would choose where to take us to – to places with no risks. We had a great time, but on the very first day I said I couldn’t live there. I think it is fair for the country of Israel to exist. This is what justice is. Why should Bulgaria and Turkey and all the other states have their own countries? Besides it’s located on the same land that was the land of origin of the Jews, but I couldn’t live there. Both my husband and I have been to Israel four times, not always together. My sister went there only once. That country is very different from what I am used to. I realized that if I stayed there I was going to be uneducated. I knew how to talk in Ivrit, but a nurse must be educated enough to help with the doctor’s round and to write some papers. I had forgotten now to write. I liked it there. I liked their democracy. That terror reached us as well. In 1982 during my second visit everybody felt indebted to vaunt with what alarm-system he had or what protecting grille there was on the floor. It would be the first thing which they showed me. The second thing – some different insurance companies had appeared. They used to make people take out insurances by force. If you refused to insure the same night you would have your shop or your apartment on fire. We all are interested in such things but in our home with our roof above us.
After some time there came a message saying that Sami and I were permitted to go. At that time my son was nine years old. I didn’t want to go without my sister. She also managed to get the necessary papers and we went on a ship after some very short preparations. At the moment the ship was out of Galata [a suburb of Varna by the sea] we all got seasick. Only my sister could go to bring some water. So until reaching the harbor in Haifa we hadn’t got out of the cots. It was the same and even worse on our way back. It was so bad that my husband had to get on the ship to take Sami out in his arms. He was so seasick he couldn’t get out of the ship. In Israel they told us that a fellow-student of my sister’s went to see her relatives in Israel and stayed there, because she didn’t want to go through the seasick horror once more. I met all of my relatives. I hadn’t seen them for seventeen years. They were very happy. There was a cousin of mine living in a kibbutz –Vida Pinkas and I spent ten days with her, Sami and her child. We were surrounded with so much care. They would organize walks and trips. They would choose where to take us to – to places with no risks. We had a great time, but on the very first day I said I couldn’t live there. I think it is fair for the country of Israel to exist. This is what justice is. Why should Bulgaria and Turkey and all the other states have their own countries? Besides it’s located on the same land that was the land of origin of the Jews, but I couldn’t live there. Both my husband and I have been to Israel four times, not always together. My sister went there only once. That country is very different from what I am used to. I realized that if I stayed there I was going to be uneducated. I knew how to talk in Ivrit, but a nurse must be educated enough to help with the doctor’s round and to write some papers. I had forgotten now to write. I liked it there. I liked their democracy. That terror reached us as well. In 1982 during my second visit everybody felt indebted to vaunt with what alarm-system he had or what protecting grille there was on the floor. It would be the first thing which they showed me. The second thing – some different insurance companies had appeared. They used to make people take out insurances by force. If you refused to insure the same night you would have your shop or your apartment on fire. We all are interested in such things but in our home with our roof above us.
And so we used to live well on the Jewish street before the war started in 1941, the flood in 1942 and the outburst of scarlet fever in 1943. In 1942 the Danube froze over, because it was very cold. This closed the German floatable route to the Eastern front. They started bombing the bottleneck at Zhelezni Vrata to open it. The ice dollops started floating down the stream and made specific noises. We could hear them at night and mom said she had been through a lot of years with the Danube frozen, but noises like these meant that something unusual was going on. The next morning we heard there was some heaping of ice dollops at the village of Archar, which is a little after Vidin. There is another bottleneck there. This was the reason for the flood. On the night of 2nd March mom took us to a tailor to take our coats. On our way back some people met us and told us the Danube was overflowing. We were walking down the streets and water was coming after us. Our neighborhood didn’t get flooded because it was on the highest place. When the water receded we had to be evacuated because there was a danger of epidemics and we went to Sofia to my mother’s nephew Rebeka Beraha. We stayed there for a month. Despite all the measures there was an outburst of scarlet fever in Vidin after the flood.