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My father died when I was 13. At that time my mother didn't have any education and she had nowhere to work. My uncles used to provide for her. It's not an easy thing to live at someone else's expense though and we did our best to save. All my friends got 'semanada' - pocket-money, which their parents used to give them per week. It wasn't that much, yet it was money anyway! I never got anything like that, not even when my father was alive, let alone after his death. I remember it was the big boom of Deanna Durbin [Hollywood actress and singer]. These were films with songs, dances, girls' favorite ones. Once after we had watched the film in the theater, my friends wanted to see it again. I had no money and one of the girls offered to pay for my ticket. And so it happened. Yet, their family wasn't like ours - they used to tell each other everything and she shared with her parents that she had bought my ticket. They in return told the widow, my mother. The ticket was 50 stotinki. I have no idea whether that was a big amount then or a small one, but I remember when everyone gathered around me scolding me. And what could I possibly do?! That film was so sweet, that one could watch it three or four times. Yet, it wasn't a custom for a fatherless girl to watch such films even once, and I, outrageously enough, had seen it twice. It was such a shame! Generally my relatives used to watch a lot over me. When my father was still alive, he sometimes used to come and get me when I was playing games in the street in broad daylight. When he died, my uncles kept watching over me like dragons.
Upon the beginning of the war we gradually stopped lessons at school and the school buildings were occupied for other purposes. As a result of this I suffered a lot of gaps in my high school education. We were given diplomas without actually deserving them, but what is to be done! It was no one's fault - neither the teachers' nor the students'! Practically we didn't have school lessons on a regular basis. We just went there and read. The 'nazified' brains of the teachers gave birth to sentences like: 'Look, the little Jew speaks Bulgarian better than you!', otherwise they didn't maltreat us. I've heard offensive words like 'chifuti' [9] or expressions like 'it's a Jewish affair', without anyone having the slightest idea what exactly it meant. Rumors were spread among Bulgarians that at Easter time Jews used to put a Christian child into a cask pricked all over with nails and rolled it down a slope, in order to supply themselves with blood for drinking [blood libel accusation]. Although such beliefs existed among Bulgarians, they were not widely spread.
The situation got worse when the Germans came and all 'Branniks' [10] and 'Legionaries' [see Bulgarian Legions] [11] emerged. Otherwise I had all kinds of friends - Bulgarians, Jews, an Armenian and a Turkish girl. Initially there wasn't any tension among us and the separation was somehow artificially created. During the war [WWII] there were plenty of hints and writings on the walls that provoked intolerance. When the laws against us started, an evening hour was introduced. Also, a quota for enrollment of Jewish students in high school was accepted - for example, three students were admitted to high school and the rest had to enroll in the technical school, and so on. Some of the Branniks even went beyond the limit and while watching the beautiful Jewish girls, used to say: 'I hate Jews but I love Jewish girls', which was quite an ugly thing to say. In accordance with the Law for the Protection of the Nation [12] my father was deprived of the right to own a shop, although he continued to work in it after the shop was transferred to another person. The same happened with my uncles, who used to have an electricity materials shop. During the war [WWII] they transferred it to one of their workers and after the war they didn't have problems regaining it. That is true: Jews weren't allowed to work in order to earn their living.
All my paternal and maternal uncles were in labor camps during the war, after 1942. My father died in 1942, before they were sent to camps. He was extremely sensitive about the attitude towards Jews. Wearing the yellow star was painful for him. [In Bulgaria yellow stars were like buttons, with two holes sewn on the lapel.] He was a worldly person, most of his friends were Bulgarian, and he couldn't take the humiliation.
I remember an interesting incident regarding these yellow stars. In order to travel to another town, we needed special permission. However, every summer I was used to travel to Bourgas, so I took off the badge, bought a ticket and went to visit my cousins there. Suddenly a higher police officer - a commandant or something like that in Sliven - came across me in the center of the town and recognized me. Anyway, I decided that I would lie to him and started inventing a story that I had a cousin in Sliven, who resembled me very much and that he was mistaking me for her. How could I possibly think that I would get away lying to him, even as a joke? It is true that my Bourgas cousin's name is Rosa Cohen, just like mine, but anyway... Then he took me to the police station, questioned me and I confessed. In the morning my maternal uncle came to take me home. This was one of the few adventures in my life. Most probably I did it not out of bravery, but out of stupidity.
Upon the beginning of the war we gradually stopped lessons at school and the school buildings were occupied for other purposes. As a result of this I suffered a lot of gaps in my high school education. We were given diplomas without actually deserving them, but what is to be done! It was no one's fault - neither the teachers' nor the students'! Practically we didn't have school lessons on a regular basis. We just went there and read. The 'nazified' brains of the teachers gave birth to sentences like: 'Look, the little Jew speaks Bulgarian better than you!', otherwise they didn't maltreat us. I've heard offensive words like 'chifuti' [9] or expressions like 'it's a Jewish affair', without anyone having the slightest idea what exactly it meant. Rumors were spread among Bulgarians that at Easter time Jews used to put a Christian child into a cask pricked all over with nails and rolled it down a slope, in order to supply themselves with blood for drinking [blood libel accusation]. Although such beliefs existed among Bulgarians, they were not widely spread.
The situation got worse when the Germans came and all 'Branniks' [10] and 'Legionaries' [see Bulgarian Legions] [11] emerged. Otherwise I had all kinds of friends - Bulgarians, Jews, an Armenian and a Turkish girl. Initially there wasn't any tension among us and the separation was somehow artificially created. During the war [WWII] there were plenty of hints and writings on the walls that provoked intolerance. When the laws against us started, an evening hour was introduced. Also, a quota for enrollment of Jewish students in high school was accepted - for example, three students were admitted to high school and the rest had to enroll in the technical school, and so on. Some of the Branniks even went beyond the limit and while watching the beautiful Jewish girls, used to say: 'I hate Jews but I love Jewish girls', which was quite an ugly thing to say. In accordance with the Law for the Protection of the Nation [12] my father was deprived of the right to own a shop, although he continued to work in it after the shop was transferred to another person. The same happened with my uncles, who used to have an electricity materials shop. During the war [WWII] they transferred it to one of their workers and after the war they didn't have problems regaining it. That is true: Jews weren't allowed to work in order to earn their living.
All my paternal and maternal uncles were in labor camps during the war, after 1942. My father died in 1942, before they were sent to camps. He was extremely sensitive about the attitude towards Jews. Wearing the yellow star was painful for him. [In Bulgaria yellow stars were like buttons, with two holes sewn on the lapel.] He was a worldly person, most of his friends were Bulgarian, and he couldn't take the humiliation.
I remember an interesting incident regarding these yellow stars. In order to travel to another town, we needed special permission. However, every summer I was used to travel to Bourgas, so I took off the badge, bought a ticket and went to visit my cousins there. Suddenly a higher police officer - a commandant or something like that in Sliven - came across me in the center of the town and recognized me. Anyway, I decided that I would lie to him and started inventing a story that I had a cousin in Sliven, who resembled me very much and that he was mistaking me for her. How could I possibly think that I would get away lying to him, even as a joke? It is true that my Bourgas cousin's name is Rosa Cohen, just like mine, but anyway... Then he took me to the police station, questioned me and I confessed. In the morning my maternal uncle came to take me home. This was one of the few adventures in my life. Most probably I did it not out of bravery, but out of stupidity.
Location
Bulgaria
Interview
Rosa Kolevska