Tag #123228 - Interview #95855 (Ida Alkalai)

From my father’s brothers only Uncle Daniel had a radio, a ‚Telefunken.’ During fascist times they hid it so that no one would see it. There was an order to confiscate all Jewish radio sets. We listened to the news on the war. During World War II, Uncle Rahamim, my mother’s brother, was interned from Sofia to Dupnitsa and lived at our place. I remember that he was with us during the bombardments. [On 13th September 1943 the British-American troops bombarded the Bulgarian towns Stara Zagora, Gorna Oryahovitsa and Kazanlak, as Bulgaria was allied with Germany. On 30th December 1943 they bombarded Sofia. In this air raid 70 people were killed and 95 wounded. The biggest air raid was in Sofia on 10th January 1944. 750 people were killed and nearly the whole city center was ruined]. He watched the planes passing through the sky and told me in Ladino that those were stars up there.

In January 1944 there were bombings in Dupnitsa. There were destroyed buildings. When we heard the sirens, we would all climb a hill near the town so that we wouldn’t get hurt. All the people from the town went there. As far as I know the American planes that went to Romania, I don’t know for what reason, didn’t throw their bombs, and when they were going back they threw their bombs over other parts of Bulgaria. It was good that they threw most of their bombs in the field.