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My father was from Volos, he grew up in Volos. I lived with him when I was a child, because until then my father had been in the army at Volos, but he was sent on a military mission to Chios Island. As I mentioned earlier, instead of him completing his military mission, he met my mother, took her away from her parents, and they ran away to Cairo together. My mother’s sister lived there, she helped them, found them work etc. We were born there, and there I met my father. From my mother’s side, we knew nothing, since she was taken away from her parents.
My father was born in about 1900. I don’t know when he went to do his military service. They never told us how he ‘abducted’ Mother from her parents. My father wasn’t very educated, he had finished only two classes of elementary school, but he thought that he knew a great deal. As far as the little world of Cairo, Egypt, was concerned, he started socializing with people and he wanted to make something for himself. Since my mother’s brothers where helping him, he also opened a workshop, and was doing really well: he had thirty workers, who he was friends with, Jews and Christians, but unfortunately this company of people led him again to gambling, playing cards, which resulted in the loss of all we had, and so we left Egypt penniless.
My father’s parents didn’t want to hear anything of us since our father was such a bum, who lost all his savings and left his five kids with no home. Before that he had been a merchant and when we came back he became a baker, and he worked for many years making unleavened matzah at the Floka factory. Right next to them was the baker of the Jewish Community. My mother, Esther, was a simple woman. Many said that she had gypsy roots; she had black hair, and when she died she didn’t have one white hair. She was a very good mother, she loved all of us. She loved mostly the boys, me and my younger brother, even though she was teaching the girls what to do in order to become decent ladies.
My father was born in about 1900. I don’t know when he went to do his military service. They never told us how he ‘abducted’ Mother from her parents. My father wasn’t very educated, he had finished only two classes of elementary school, but he thought that he knew a great deal. As far as the little world of Cairo, Egypt, was concerned, he started socializing with people and he wanted to make something for himself. Since my mother’s brothers where helping him, he also opened a workshop, and was doing really well: he had thirty workers, who he was friends with, Jews and Christians, but unfortunately this company of people led him again to gambling, playing cards, which resulted in the loss of all we had, and so we left Egypt penniless.
My father’s parents didn’t want to hear anything of us since our father was such a bum, who lost all his savings and left his five kids with no home. Before that he had been a merchant and when we came back he became a baker, and he worked for many years making unleavened matzah at the Floka factory. Right next to them was the baker of the Jewish Community. My mother, Esther, was a simple woman. Many said that she had gypsy roots; she had black hair, and when she died she didn’t have one white hair. She was a very good mother, she loved all of us. She loved mostly the boys, me and my younger brother, even though she was teaching the girls what to do in order to become decent ladies.
Period
Interview
Moshe Burla