Tag #128066 - Interview #77994 (ester josifova)

My father believed that we had to have secular education and sent us - my two sisters, my brother and me - to study in a Bulgarian school. He wanted his children to speak Bulgarian well. Many Jewish children went to Bulgarian schools. I had friends who went to Bulgarian schools just like me.

I graduated from the economics high-school in Sofia. That school was the closest to our house. After that the Jewish choir sent me to a private music school because I had a nice voice and they thought that I should develop my singing talent. My favorite subjects at school were history and singing. I even went to an opera singing competition at the Sofia Opera before our internment in Kjustendil. I won it but my brother advised my father to make me give up my career in singing because he thought that I might enter an 'unsuitable' surrounding. I dealt with the household until our internment and did some dressmaking - I sewed clothes and designed models. My older sister, Lika, graduated from a classical studies high- school.