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My first good friend was a Jew – Viska Lazarova. We were inseparable from the first grade until the internment. She lived on 32 ‘Serdika’ street. She used to come to my place on ‘Makriopolska’ street, collected me and we would go to ‘Fotinov’ school together. I had another friend – Eti Rahamimova, she was my neighbor as well. Our parents were friends, too. I also had Bulgarian friends. We are still close with a classmate from the primary school and we call each other on our birthdays. Her name is Magdalena Stefanova. Her brother, Kolyo, was my bodyguard. And as I was faint-hearted and some of the boys were teasing me, he didn’t let them touch me.
Mum wanted me to spend more time at home, not to meet a lot of children so that I wouldn’t catch some disease. I used to have some very interesting toys – a sleeping doll Freda, a little gramophone with records, a car that could be wound and made curves, a jumping monkey, the Monopole game. All those were bought from abroad and ordered by my father, probably to friends or colleagues. I can’t be sure. I didn’t like the dolls so much as a one-legged teddy bear. Usually the children came to me, to my place. Or, if I was ill, and I was ill very often, I put the toys on the windowsill and the children looked at them from the outside. When dad was ill and stayed in bed at home, we would play cards.
My big dream was to learn to ride a bike. Mum’s financial situation wasn’t very good and hiring a bike cost, with the old money, five leva per quarter of an hour and five leva was the cost of a loaf of bread, white bread. Mum could only give me five leva per week. And by the time I had taken the bike from the place where I hired it to my street, five minutes had alreay elapsed. Some of the other children would say, ‘Let me ride it for a while! Let me ride it for a while!’. And then I had to return the bike. So this is one of my unfulfiled dreams – to ride a bike.
Mum wanted me to spend more time at home, not to meet a lot of children so that I wouldn’t catch some disease. I used to have some very interesting toys – a sleeping doll Freda, a little gramophone with records, a car that could be wound and made curves, a jumping monkey, the Monopole game. All those were bought from abroad and ordered by my father, probably to friends or colleagues. I can’t be sure. I didn’t like the dolls so much as a one-legged teddy bear. Usually the children came to me, to my place. Or, if I was ill, and I was ill very often, I put the toys on the windowsill and the children looked at them from the outside. When dad was ill and stayed in bed at home, we would play cards.
My big dream was to learn to ride a bike. Mum’s financial situation wasn’t very good and hiring a bike cost, with the old money, five leva per quarter of an hour and five leva was the cost of a loaf of bread, white bread. Mum could only give me five leva per week. And by the time I had taken the bike from the place where I hired it to my street, five minutes had alreay elapsed. Some of the other children would say, ‘Let me ride it for a while! Let me ride it for a while!’. And then I had to return the bike. So this is one of my unfulfiled dreams – to ride a bike.
Location
Bulgaria
Interview
Reyna Lidgi