Tag #127091 - Interview #78448 (Eli (Eliyau) Perahya)

I have two children from Elsa: my daughter Lina, born in 1943, and my son David, born in 1947. Lina was named after Grandmother Belina, as for David, he was named according to a dream Elsa had a short time before his birth. She saw a very old and wise man holding a baby in his arms and giving him to her saying, ‘This is your baby. You will name him David.’ As we lived all together in the house the children weren’t just our children, they were the ‘children of the house.’ Later we moved, all together, to Tepebashi, a residential district on the European side of Istanbul, near the Jewish neighborhood. Our apartment was named Jul Apartiman after its owner, Mr. Jules Blumenthal, a rich and famous trader, representative and producer in Turkey of Columbia and His Master’s Voice records. We had such wonderful days; however, very unfortunately, my wife Elsa died of cancer in 1949, in spite of all the efforts by the renowned physician Dr. Barbut.

I was a widower with two children. Although we lived together as a family I was feeling the absence of a wife very dearly. In 1951, my then-sister-in-law, Klara, and I decided to get married. Our wedding ceremony was very plain and simple. After kissing our mothers’ hands I went out with Klara to get married in the City Marriage Office with two witnesses we found there. After the wedding took place, we took the rabbi of the Kal de los Frankos Synagogue on Sahsuvar Street [founded by the Italian Sephardim, Comunita Israelitico-Italiana di Istanbul in 1886], who was also on duty at the Hemdat le Avram Synagogue in the summer months, and we went to Buyukada by boat. He performed our wedding ceremony under the hupa [chuppah], only in front of a minyan. We had our honeymoon for one week on Buyukada.

The same year Klara had a daughter whom we named Elsa, in memory of my late wife. Klara being a generous and selfless person raised all three kids together treating them completely equally. I’m so grateful to her.